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PRINCETON,  N.  J.  *ig 


Presented    by    \~V«^:S\  C/\(2.T\-V    Vc:A-V-Vo\^  . 


Division 
Section 


A  CALM   REVIEW 


OF 


THE  INAUGURAL  ADDRESS 


OP 


PROF„  CHARLES  A.  BRIGGS. 


BY 

EDWARD   D.   MORRIS. 


Reprove  a  man  that  hath  understanding,  and  he  will  under- 
stand knowledge.— HE^^^Vf  Proverb, 


NEW  YORK: 
ANSON   D.  F.  RANDOLPH   &   COMPANY, 

38    WEST   TWENTY-THIRD    STREET. 


COPYRIGHT,   1891,  BY 

ANSOl^  D.  F.  RANDOLPH  &  CO. 


TO  THE 

PRESBYTERIAN    MINISTERIAL  ASSOCIATION 

OF    CINCINNATI 

this  Paper,  prepared  by  their  appointment,  approved  when  read 
before  thetn,  and  printed  at  their  generous  request,  is  hereby, 
with  thanks  for  many  marks  of  their  love  and  confidence, 

AFFECTIONATELY   DEDICATED, 

in  the  hope  that  it  may  prove  acceptable  to  other  minds,  and  in 
some  small  degree  may  help  to  guide  our  beloved  Church  along 
that  mediate  course  between  blind  conservatism  and  an  incon- 
siderate radicalism  in  which  its  peace,  its  strength,  and  its 
prosperity  must  ever  lie. 

The  Author. 


THE  INAUGURAL  ADDRESS. 

A    CALM    REVIEW    OF    ITS    POSITIONS. 


No  address  delivered  of  late  years  on  the  platform  of  any 
among  our  Theological  Seminaries  has  attracted  so  much 
attention  or  excited  such  varied  comment  as  the  one  whose 
consideration  is  now  proposed.  This  interest  is  due  in  part 
to  the  special  prominence  of  the  Institution  where  the  ad- 
dress was  delivered,  and  to  the  nature  and  purpose  of  the 
new  Professorship  at  the  time  endowed  and  established, 
and  in  part  also  to  the  high  standing  of  the  speaker  as  one 
of  the  foremost  scholars  on  the  continent  in  particular  lines 
of  study  and  instruction.  "What  was  said  in  the  address  on 
certain  doctrinal  questions  of  great  importance,  and  espe- 
cially on  some  matters  which  are  just  now  exciting  contro- 
versy among  us,  doubtless  tended  to  increase  this  interest. 
There  are  also  some  elements  in  the  existing  condition  of 
Protestant  thought  generally,  in  the  apparently  transitional 
character  of  the  period,  in  the  popular  disaffection  toward 
old  methods  and  opinions,  in  the  extensive  desire  for  what 
is  novel  and  even  revolutionary  in  the  domain  of  theology, 
which  have  contributed  still  further  to  such  interest.  And 
these  exceptional  features  of  the  case — easily  recognized  by 
all — will  furnish,  it  is  believed,  whatever  justification  is 
needful  for  a  sincere,  faithful,  earnest  examination  of  this 
remarkable  address,  as  it  is  now  in  an  authoritative  form 
pubhshed  for  general  inspection. 

(5) 


6  THE  INAUGUEAL   ADDEESS   OF 

It  is  not  the  object  of  this  review  to  animadvert  in  any 
way  upon  the  distinguished  speaker,  to  whom  the  writer 
has  long  been  bound  by  strong  ties  of  friendship.  Nor  has 
he  anything  to  say  respecting  any  ecclesiastical  issues  pres- 
ent or  prospective  that  may  spring  from  the  positions  taken 
in  the  address, — unless  it  be  to  avow  his  frank  opinion  that 
the  best  way  to  deal  with  any  error  that  may  be  discovered 
there  lies,  not  in  judicial  procedures,  but  in  such  fair  and 
thorough  discussion  as  shall  expose  such  error  and  bring  the 
whole  truth  in  the  case  more  simply  and  more  fully  to  the 
intelligence  and  conviction  of  the  Church.*  Nor  is  the 
writer  disposed  to  criticise  unfavorably  the  general  quality 
and  temper  of  this  address,  beyond  the  honest  acknowledg- 
ment of  his  regret  that,  amid  so  much  that  is  interesting  in 
thought  and  brilliant  in  diction,  there  should  be  anything 
that  savors  of  presumptuous  confidence  in  what  is  expressed, 
or  of  contemptuous  reference  to  the  beliefs  and  teachings 
of  other  minds  deservedly  recognized  as  worthy  of  the 
highest  respect.  Blemishes  of  this  class  in  such  a  produc- 
tion have  at  least  the  bad  effect  of  predisposing  those  who 
note  them,  to  look  with  suspicion  or  with  prejudice  on 
what  they  might  otherwise  have  been  inclined  to  regard 
with  favor. 

Particular  praise  of  the  address  is  hardly  needful  here  ; 

*  What  the  writer  has  seen  and  known  of  ecclesiastical  procedures 
for  the  arresting  and  correction  of  current  errors  of  this  class,  has 
compelled  him  to  regard  them  with  considerable  misgiving,  and  to 
prefer  greatly  what  seems  to  him  a  more  effective  way,  the  way  of 
fair,  free,  thorough  discussion.  Respecting  the  value  and  the  outcome 
of  such  discussion,  he  has  almost  unbounded  faith.  In  its  presence 
no  real  error  is  likely  to  maintain  for  long  a  firm  footing  in  our 
Church  ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  any  error  that  cannot  be  overmatched 
in  discussion,  will  be  likely  to  live  and  exert  its  baleful  influence  in 
the  Church,  even  though  it  were  condemned  by  the  strongest  ecclesi- 
astical verdicts. 


REV.   CHARLES   A.    BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  7 

it  speaks  for  itself,  and  in  a  manner  that  cannot  fail  to 
command  extensive  interest.  Many  of  its  suggestions  are 
deserving  of  large  respect ;  many  of  its  sentences  sparkle 
with  genius  ;  the  glow  of  a  high  enthusiasm,  like  the  pas- 
sion for  battle,  mantles  most  of  its  pages.  Though  not 
always  free  from  rhetorical  faults,  it  exhibits  in  general 
marked  skill  in  style  and  diction  ;  it  shows  extensive,  though 
not  always  well-digested  learning ;  it  manifests  theological 
acumen  and  vigor,  though  sometimes  betraying  a  lack  of 
discrimination  and  of  depth ;  it  everywhere  reveals  admi- 
rable ardor  and  earnestness,  even  in  some  instances  at  the 
sacrifice  of  discretion.  It  introduces  the  reader  to  a  wide 
and  interesting,  though  somewhat  multifarious  collection  of 
material,  but  fails  in  some  degree  to  organize  such  material 
into  full  unity  and  compactness  ;  it  is  too  much  a  congeries 
or  compilation — too  little  a  single,  well-developed,  vital 
whole.  All  in  all,  however,  it  will  not  only  take  its  place 
fitly  among  the  brightest  productions  from  the  fertile  pen 
of  its  author,  but  also  rank  high  in  the  general  list  of  inau- 
gural discourses  of  this  class. 

The  general  aim  of  the  address  is  sufiiciently  indicated 
by  the  occasion  of  its  delivery, — the  instituting  of  a  new 
Professorship,  hitherto  unknown  in  this  distinct  form  in 
our  Church,  for  the  introduction  and  development  of  a 
new  science  or  discipline  into  our  theological  cultus,  the 
science  or  discipline  of  Biblical  Theology.  The  speaker  is 
seeking  to  set  forth  this  special  form  of  instruction  at  its 
full  value :  to  describe  this  young  science  in  its  nature  and 
field,  to  give  some  account  of  its  aspirations  and  methods 
and  contents,  and,  in  general,  to  commend  it  to  the  respect 
of  all  who  are  interested  in  theology,  and  particularly  of 
those  who  are  specially  concerned  with  the  training  of 
young  men  in  our  theological  institutions.  How  far  has 
lie  succeeded  in  this  purpose  ? 


THE  INAUGURAL  ADDRESS   OF 


SOURCES    OF   AUTHOEITT   IN   KELIGION. 

It  may  be  said  in  all  frankness  at  the  outset  that  it  is 
doubtful  whether  this  purpose  was  much  subserved  by  the 
preliminary  discussion  respecting  the  Bible,  the  Church, 
and  the  Reason,  regarded  as  three  sources  of  di\ane  author- 
ity as  to  religious  doctrine  and  duty.  While  the  author 
nowhere  represents  these  as  co-ordinate  sources,  and  dis- 
tinctly recognizes  the  Bible  as  the  superior  source,  yet  his 
language  seems  both  to  separate  the  three  sources  too  wide- 
ly, as  if  they  could  be  independent  of  each  other,  and  also 
to  place  them  practically  too  nearly  on  the  same  level  as  to 
authoritativeness.  In  fact,  there  are  very  few  who  find 
God — to  use  his  descriptive  phrase — through  the  Bible 
without  the  adjunctive  influence  and  teaching  of  the  Church ; 
and  fewer  still,  at  least  among  Protestants,  who  find  God 
through  the  Church,  without  the  illuminating  aid  of  the 
Bible.  As  for  those  who,  openly  rejecting  the  assistance 
of  both  the  Bible  and  the  Church,  are  said  to  find  God 
through  the  Reason  alone,  on  what  warrant  can  Professor 
Briggs  maintain  that  they  have  any  title  to  a  place  in  the 
company  of  the  faithful  ?  If  James  Martineau,  who  could 
see,  as  is  here  alleged,  no  proper  authority  for  his  religious 
belief  in  the  Church  and  the  Bible,  but  in  his  own  reason 
alone,  were  to  be  so  classed,*  is  it  not  a  very  sweeping  and 


*  It  is  a  familiar  aphorism  of  Coleridge  :  Ibelieve  that  maiiy  Unitari- 
ans are  Christians,  but  am  sure  that  Unitarianism  is  not  Christianity. 
While  we  exercise  the  broadest  charity  in  our  judgments  of  men  who 
seem  to  us  to  be  departing  from  the  essence  of  the  faith  once  delivered 
to  the  saints,  we  are  bound  to  see  to  it  that  our  charitable  disposition 
shall  not  lead  us  into  any  compromise  of  the  faith  itself.  The  fol- 
lowing sentence,  wliich  the  Professor  must  have  overlooked  in  a  re- 
cent work  of  Martineau  quoted  in  his  address,  will  illustrate  in  a 
way  truly  painful  the  peril  of  assigning  to  any  man  of  rationalizing 
opinions  and  tendencies  a  place  in  the  company  of  the  faithful — the 


KEY.   CHARLE3   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  9 

dangerous  inference  from  one  such  case  to  conclude  or  even 
imply  that  rationalists  in  general  may  be  counted  in  that 
Trmltitudo  Jidelium  who,  according  to  St.  Hugo,  constitute 
the  true  Church  of  Christ  in  the  world  ?  Is  it  true,  as  is 
alleged,  that  tlie  average  opinion  of  the  Christian  world 
would  not  assign  to  Charles  Spurgeon  a  higher  place  in  the 
kingdom  of  God  than  Martineau  ?  "Why  should  such  men 
be  included  in  a  class  to  which  they  have  no  desire  to  be- 
long, and  whose  companionship  they  would  openly  spurn, 
and  from  which  not  only  our  own  Confession  (chap.  i.  1 ; 
X.  4 ;  xvi.  7),  but  also  the  universal  judgment  of  evangelical 
Protestantism,  excludes  them  ?  How  can  an  intimation  of 
this  sort  be  justified,  unless  it  be  on  the  assumption  that  in 
tbese  cases  the  Reason  really  becomes  an  authority  superior 
to  the  Church  and  the  Scripture,  and  is  of  itself  sufficient 
to  lead  the  soul  to  God  and  to  everlasting  life  ? 

When  it  is  remembered  that  the  speaker  is  not  referring 
here  to  devout  heathen  who  may  haply  find  God  without 
the  help  of  His  written  Word,  but  to  known  rationalists, 
who  profess  to  have  received  that  Word  and  to  have  set  it 
aside  as  in  no  sense  an  authority  in  belief,  does  it  not  be- 
come clear  to  us  that  the  cathohc  Professor  has  not  weighed 
well  the  possible  error  and  mischief  apparent,  on  close  in- 
spection, in  his  genial  but  unguarded  utterances?  And  is 
there  not  implied  in  his  plea  for  the  rationalism  which  re- 
invisible  Body  of  Christ :  "  The  blight  of  birth-sin,  with  its  involun- 
tary perdition  ;  the  scheme  of  expiatory  redemption,  with  its  vicarious 
salvation  ;  the  incarnation,  with  its  low  postulates  of  God  and  man, 
and  its  unworkable  doctrine  of  two  natures  and  one  person  ;  the  ofHcial 
transmission  of  grace  through  material  elements  in  tlie  keeping  of  a 
consecrated  corporation  ;  the  second  coming  of  Christ  to  summon  the 
dead  and  part  the  sheep  from  the  goats  at  the  general  judgment — all 
are  the  growth  of  a  mythical  literature,  or  Messianic  dream,  or  Phari- 
saic theology,  or  sacramental  superstition,  or  popular  apotheosis." — 
8eai  of  Authority  in  Religion,  p.  650. 


10  THE  INAUGURAL  ADDRESS  OP 

jects  the  Bible  an  unwarranted  reflection  upon  the  position 
which  Protestantism  has  with  entire  unanimity  maintained 
as  to  such  rationalism  from  the  days  of  the  Keformation 
until  now  ?  An  intelligent  Protestantism  does  not  decry 
the  human  reason  when  in  the  exercise  of  its  proper  func- 
tions, within  its  own  proper  sphere ;  nor  does  it  question 
the  worth  of  the  creeds  and  theologies  of  the  Church  as  in- 
valuable helps  in  the  attainment  and  the  culture  of  personal 
faith  in  God.  But  an  intelligent  and  devout  Protestantism 
places  neither  of  these  sources  of  authority  by  the  side  of 
the  Bible,  as  though  either  were  in  itself  a  sufficient  or  a 
final  source  of  belief.  The  Truth  of  God  as  contained  in 
the  inspired  Scripture,  believed  in  and  affirmed  by  the 
Church,  justified  and  embraced  through  the  reason  and  the 
conscience,  is  held  by  all  evangelical  minds  to  be  the  only 
legitimate  basis  either  of  acceptable  faith  or  of  the  right  of 
any  man  to  a  place  in  the  blessed  company  of  the  faithful ; 
and  all  liberality  which  goes  very  far  beyond  these  bound- 
aries must  be  viewed  as  both  unwarrantable  and  dangerous. 

BARRIERS   TO   BIBLICAL   THEOLOGY. 

If  a  mistake  has  been  made  at  this  point  in  the  address, 
another  of  greater  importance  appears  in  the  account  which 
it  gives  by  way  of  further  preliminary  respecting  cer- 
tain barriers  which  are  said  to  have  been  raised  by  men, 
chiefly  by  theologians,  against  the  Bible  itself  as  a  source 
of  authority  in  belief.  The  first  of  these  barriers  is  styled 
Bihliolatry,  which  is  defined  as  the  worshipping  of  the  Bible 
as  a  book,  as  though  there  were  some  magical  virtue  in  it 
as  such.  If  there  is  any  foundation  whatever  for  such  a 
charge,  the  accusation  seems  in  this  case  to  trip  too  lightly 
from  careless  lips :  it  is  utterly  unsustained  by  fact  in  the 
very  exaggerated  form  in  which  it  is  here  presented.  Bib- 
liolatry  is  not  a  sin  current  among  Protestants :   and  the 


-REV.    CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  11 

characterization  of  the  profound  reverence  with  which  they 
habitually  regard  and  treat  the  Holy  Word,  by  such  a  term, 
is  at  the  best  very  questionable. — Kespecting  the  three  bar- 
riers which  are  next  named,  barriers  springing  up  from 
false  views  and  teachings  as  to  the  authenticity,  the  inspira- 
tion, and  the  inerrancy  of  the  Sacred  Scriptures,  it  is  need- 
ful to  speak  at  greater  length. 

AUTHENTICITY. 

Reversing  somewhat  the  order  in  which  these  barriers  are 
presented  in  the  address,  and  speaking  first  of  Atithenticity, 
I  desire  at  the  outset  to  express  my  personal  belief  in  the 
validity  and  worth  of  the  new  science  or  process  which 
bears,  rather  unfortunately,  the  name  of  the  Higher  Criti- 
cism. Beyond  the  relatively  Kmited  sphere  of  what  is 
known  as  textual  criticism,  or  the  exegesis  of  this  or  that 
particular  verse  or  passage,  there  is,  beyond  all  question,  a 
true  and  an  important  sphere  for  the  larger  scientific  pro- 
cess to  which  this  name  has  been  applied.  In  other  words, 
there  is  room  and  occasion,  especially  just  at  the  present 
stage  of  exegetical  investigation,  for  broader  and  more 
thorough  inquiry  respecting  the  style,  structure,  date,  au- 
thorship, scope,  aim,  and  relations  historical  and  doctrinal, 
of  the  particular  books  or  of  certain  groups  of  books  to 
each  other  and  to  the  entire  Scripture.  Much  work  of  this 
sort  had  been  done  by  biblical  scholars  long  before  the  new 
science  had  come  into  existence  as  a  separate  branch  of 
study ;  but  no  one  who  is  familiar  with  the  present  state 
and  needs  of  specific  exegesis  can  fail  to  see  that  a  much 
larger  work  along  these  lines  remains  to  be  accomplished.* 

*I  should  be  sorry  to  say  a  word  that  nn>ht  seem  to  imply  any  lack 
of  sympathy  with  this  class  of  higher  critics  while  they  are  engaged 
in  this  important  service  for  Christ  and  His  Church.  Contenii)lating 
their  labors  only  from  the  outside,  and  ifa  no  sense  as  an  expert,  I  am 


12  THE  INAUGURAL  ADDRESS  OF 

But  I  have  been  obliged,  especially  of  late,  to  draw  a 
sharp  line  of  distinction  between  a  Higher  Criticism  which 
is  conservative,  reverent,  evangelical — which  approaches  the 
Bible  and  deals  with  it  as  if  it  were  a  veritable  Book  of 
God — which  searches  and  investigates  that  Book  only  that 
it  may  present  the  one  sublime  Revelation  in  more  lumin- 
ous and  more  glorious  lights :  and  a  Higher  Criticism 
which  treats  the  sacred  volume  on  materialistic  principles 
as  if  it  were  the  compilation  of  a  national  literature  merely, 
which  occupies  itself  with  negations  chiefly,  is  largely 
busied  with  the  discovery  of  discrepancies  and  defects,  and 
is  apparently  happiest  when  it  has  said  something  that 
specially  shocks  our  reverential  feeling  toward  the  Book 
of  books.  That  critics  of  the  first  class  will  grow  more 
careful,  more  circumspect,  as  they  advance  in  the  prosecu- 
tion of  their  delicate  task,  and  more  conscious  of  the  peculiar 
perils  as  well  as  the  possible  benefits  of  their  favorite 
study,  may  be  confidently  expected  ;  and  as  confidently  may 
we  expect  to  find  a  clearer  and  loftier  light  shining  ulti- 
mately upon  the  divine  Word  as  the  result  of  their  investiga- 
tions.. On  the  other  hand,  it  is  greatly  to  be  feared  that 
critics  of  the  second  class,  not  sufficiently  held  back  by  the 
sweet  constraints  of  an  evangelical  piety,  may  in  this 
country,  like  their  allies  in  England  and  Germany,  pro- 
ceed to  the  point  where  their  labors  become  destructive 
rather  than  constructive,  and  tend  rather  to  a  subtle  unbe- 
lief than  to  the  nurture  and  strengthening  of  an  evangel- 
ical faith. 

It  is  a  truism  to  say  that  this  new  science,  like  every 
other  science,  must  submit  itself  to  the  old  and  universal 

bound  to  confess  my  great  interest  in  what  they  are  doing,  and  my 
faith  both  in  them  and  in  the  issues  of  their  labors.  So  long  as  su- 
preme loyalty  to  TJie  Book  animates  them,  God  will  not  suffer  them  to 
go  far  astray. 


KEV.    CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  13 

test :  What  is  it  doing  ?  The  address  answers  this  ques- 
tion in  part  by  assuring  us  that  Higher  Criticism  has  shown 
"  that  Moses  did  not  write  the  Pentateuch  or  Job ;  that  Ezra 
did  not  write  the  Chronicles,  Ezra,  or  Nehemiah ;  that 
Jeremiah  did  not  write  the  Kings  or  Lamentations ;  that 
David  did  not  write  the  Psalter,  but  only  a  few  of  the 
Psalms  ;  that  Solomon  did  not  write  the  Song  of  Songs  or 
Ecclesiastes,  and  only  a  portion  of  the  Proverbs  ;  and  that 
Isaiah  did  not  write  half  of  the  book  that  bears  his  name." 
Dr.  Briggs  further  tells  us  that  Higher  Criticism  has  ascer- 
tained that  the  great  mass  of  the  Old  Testament  was  com- 
posed by  authors  whose  names  and  historic  connection  with 
their  writings  have  passed  into  utter  oblivion  ;  that  the 
whole  is  a  combination  of  miscellaneous  fragments  to  an 
extent  never  suspected  before  the  higher  critics  were  born  ; 
that  the  matter  of  dates,  occasions,  conditions  as  well  as 
authorship,  is  involved  in  inextricable  confusion  ;  that  ed- 
itors and  redactors  and  chroniclers,  Elohists  and  Jehovists 
and  Deuteronoraists  and  Deutero-prophets,  whose  names 
and  personalities  we  know  nothing  about,  have  had  as  much 
to  do  as  the  original  authors  with  the  books  as  we  now  have 
them ;  and  so  on.*  How  all  this  has  been  found  out,  it 
is  not  easy  for  the  ordinary  mind  to  discover  ;  but  we  cer- 
tainly have  a  right  to  ask,  in  all  soberness,  whether  this 
whole  process  has  been  truly  scientific  ?  Have  the  critics 
historical  data  sufficient  in  quantity  and  clearness,  adequate 
grounds  and  premises  and  materials,  upon  which  to  base 
such  a  vast  fabric  of  revolutionary  conclusions  ?  Are  we 
sure  that  nothing  of  all  this  is  traceable  to  the  fertile  feel- 
ing, to  the  literary  sense  or  instinct,  to  the  pectoral  con- 
sciousness and  moral  disposition  of  the  critics  themselves, 


*  See  Biblical  Study  and   Whither ;  also,  Art.  in  Mag.  of  Christ. 
Lit.,  Dec,  1889  ;  and  a  recent  Address  reported  in  Christian  Union. 


14  THE  INAUGURAL  ADDRESS  OF 

rather  than  to  any  justifying  causes  and  reasons  of  an  ex- 
ternal sort  ?  Is  this  real  science,  or  only  a  speculating 
fancy,  an  exuberant  guessing  faculty,  disporting  itself  in 
the  sedate  robes  of  the  true  scientist  ?  ^ 

A  real  science  always  advances  beyond  the  sphere  of 
mere  negations ;  and  Higher  Criticism,  if  it  would  prove 
itself  to  be  such,  must  follow  the  universal  law,  and  show 
itself  to  be  something  more  than  a  studied  effort  to  prove 
that  nothing  in  the  Old  Testament  is  as  we  have  supposed 
it  to  be.  A  real  science  always  leads  the  mind  on  from 
doubt  to  certainty  ;  but  in  this  instance  are  we  not  led 
away  from  what  we  fondly  supposed  to  be  certainties  into 
a  vast,  variable,  shifting  area  of  guesses,  hypotheses,  con- 
jectures, from  which  we  emerge  to  find  an  impenetrable 
mist  of  doubt  resting  upon  the  alleged  divineness  of  the 
greater  part  of  the  Old  Testament  ?  The  more  the  listener 
hears  the  less  he  really  knows,  and  the  darker  and  more 
painful  the  uncertainty  which  seems  to  him  to  rest  like  a 
pall  upon  the  Sacred  Word.  This  is  not  the  ordinary  result 
of  true  science,  nor  is  such  a  result  in  any  sense  desirable. 
Certainly  there  is  nothing  helpful  to  knowledge  or  to  faith, 
and  th^re  may  be  much  that  is  mischievous,  in  a  process 
whose  practical  consequence  is  either  a  bundle  of  negations 
such  as  this  address  enumerates,  or  an  accunmlation  of  fog 
and  surmise  which  leaves  us  half  the  time  in  doubt  whether 
we  are  dealing  with  a  veritable  Book  of  God,  or  only — to 
use  a  phrase  current  in  some  critical  circles— with  a  Jewish 


*  See  the  very  acute  remarks  of  Gladstone  in  his  recent  essay  on 
this  point ;  especially  his  suggestion  as  to  "the  fashions  of  the  time 
and  school "  among  specialists  In  this  department ;  to  the  fact  that 
many  of  their  conclusions  "appear  in  a  great  measure  floating  and 
uncertain  ";  and  to  the  further  fact  of  "war  waged  on  critical  grounds 
within  the  critical  camp." — I'he  Impregnable  Hock  of  Holy  Scripture, 
pp.  6-15,  Amer.  Ed. 


EEV.    CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  15 

literature,  not  very  much  unlike  the  literature  of  other 
ancient  nations.* 

How  far  the  same  negational  and  mystifying  process 
may  be  carried  by  the  Higher  Criticism  of  this  lower  type, 
in  dealing  with  the  New  Testament,  the  future  alone  can 
determine.  Any  one  who  has  had  occasion  to  note  the 
history  of  this  destructive  process  in  Germany  and  in  Eng- 
land— who  knows  how  persistently  the  authorship  of  one 
of  the  four  Gospels  and  the  materials  and  sources  and  ar- 
rangement of  the  others  have  been  questioned,  how  stren- 
uously the  authenticity  and  authoritativeuess  of  some  of 
the  Epistles  have  been  challenged,  how  openly  the  cardinal 
elements  of  miracle  and  prophecy  have  been  rejected,  how 
many  essential  doctrines  have  been  either  slighted  or  tlirown 
aside,  how  much  all  that  is  supernatural  has  been  boldly 
called  in  question  or  cast  out  altogether, — may  well  be  anx- 
ious as  to  the  issue.  The  whole  problem  happily  lies  at 
closer  range,  with  its  materials  in  more  accessible  form,  and 
with  fewer  chances  for  dangerous  divergence.  The  greater 
part  of  the  New  Testament  can  never  be  assigned  to  un- 
known authors  or  to  other  centuries,  earlier  or  later.  The 
story  of  Christ  can  never,  like  the  stories  of  creation  and 
the  fall,  be  pronounced  a  holy  legend  or  a  poetical  allegory ; 
the  Christian  Church,  born  of  the  New  Testament,  is  a 
living  and  an  unchallengeable  fact.  Yet  if  the  critics  of 
this  class  can  by  their  scientific  methods  reduce  the  Old 
Testament  to  the   fragmentary,  obscure,  dissected,  unat- 

*  It  is  of  course  to  be  understood  that  our  acceptance  of  the  Bible 
does  not  turn  on  the  question  of  our  ability  to  name  the  authors  of  the 
several  books.  Yet  is  it  not  hard  to  see  what  advantage  is  gained 
either  to  science  or  to  experience  by  the  process  of  obscuration  on  this 
point,  in  which  some  of  the  higher  critics  seem  to  find  a  pleasure  in 
indulging  ?  Cracking  a  nut  to  find  it  hollow,  is  not  a  nutritious  or 
cheering  business. 


16  THE  INAUGURAL  ADDRESS  OF 

tractive,  and  inniitritious  condition  in  which  this  address 
describes  it,  who  can  tell  what  the  same  process  may  yet 
accomplish  in  the  New  ?  * 

I  should  do  great  injustice  to  this  young  science,  and  to  its 
better  representatives,  if  I  were  to  charge  them  with  any 
complicity  with  the  bad  issues  and  impressions  to  which 
reference  has  just  been  made.  No  fair  mind  can  be  indif- 
ferent to  at  least  four  marked  benefits  that  have  already  come 
to  Christian  scholarship  and  to  the  whole  Church  of  God 
from  the  sound  and  wise  application  of  these  critical  princi- 
ples:  the  historic  development  of  the  Hebraic  legislation 

*  I  have  lately  read  a  history  of  the  Development  of  Theology  in 
Germany  since  the  age  of  Kant,  by  Dr.  Pfleiderer,  Prof,  of  Theology 
at  Berlin.  One  part  of  the  treatise  is  devoted  to  the  record  of  certain 
theological  developments  in  Great  Britain  during  the  same  period. 
The  reading  of  this  volume,  especially  of  the  chapters  on  Criticism 
and  Exegesis,  has  impressed  me  anew,  and  very  painfully,  by  its  ex- 
hibitions of  the  irreverent  and  reckless  handling  of  the  Bible  by  many 
German  and  some  English  scholars,  and  also  of  the  speculative  and 
skeptical  doubts,  verging  toward  positive  unbelief,  as  to  some  important 
doctrines,  such  as  miracle  and  prophecy,  which  stand  in  special  rela- 
tions to  the  inspiration  and  authoritativeness  of  the  Word  of  God.  I 
might  fill  pages  with  illustrations  of  the  bold  theorizing,  the  conflict- 
ing hypotheses,  the  destructive  conjectures,  the  unbelieving  temper 
and  purpose,  which  have  characterized  in  numerous  instances  the 
treatment  of  the  Bible  by  this  class  of  critics.  Amid  much  that  is  or 
will  be  made  valuable  in  future  exegesis  and  future  theologizing  on 
the  biblical  basis,  there  is  much  which  it  would  be  very  undesirable 
to  import  to  our  shores,  or  to  introduce  into  our  study  of  the  Book  of 
God.  The  undcvout  flippancy,  the  recklessness  in  speculation,  the 
confident  assertion  of  individual  taste  or  opinion,  the  contemptuous 
indifference  to  the  judgment  of  others  or  the  beliefs  of  the  Church, 
are  traits  which  cannot  find  favor  with  the  American  mind  ;  and,  on 
the  other  hnnd,  the  evident  lack  of  concord  on  many  of  the  points  dis- 
cussed, and  the  hot  warfare  waged  by  one  speculator  against  another, 
and  other  like  phenomena,  compel  one  to  question  in  his  own  mind 
whether  the  whole  process  in  its  present  stage  is  not  doing  more  harm 
than  good. 


REV.   CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  17 

along  lines  both  supernatural  and  natural,  the  beautiful 
growth  of  the  Hebrew  psalmody  from  the  Davidic  stock,  the 
orderly  progression  of  predictive  prophecy,  especially  re- 
specting Christ,  and  the  wonderful,  superhuman  progress  of 
doctrine  in  both  the  Old  Testament  and  the  New.  These 
results  enable  us  better  to  understand  the  Bible  as  an  in- 
spired Book,  and  fill  us  with  a  fresh  sense  of  its  unspeak- 
able worth  as  a  divine  revelation.  When  all  who  claim  to 
be  higher  critics  shall  cease  from  their  conjectural  dissec- 
tions and  reconstructions,  and  shall,  by  working  along  these 
loftier  lines,  give  us  positive  results  such  as  will  ex- 
pand thought  and  nourish  intelligent  faith,  the  title  of 
Higher  Criticism  to  a  place  among  the  Christian  sciences 
will  be  much  more  clearly  established. 

ESrSPIKATION. 

Passing  on  to  the  closely  related  matter  of  Inspiration^ 
we  are  confronted  at  once  by  the  question  of  terms.  The 
words  verhal  and  dictation^  so  often  used  in  this  address, 
are  certainly  misleading,  if  they  are  intended  to  describe 
the  common  doctrine  of  evangelical  Protestantism  on  this 
subject.  There  are  some  Protestants  who  aflarm  an  inspi- 
ration which  is  simply  dictation  throughout — the  sacred 
writers  being  passive  pens,  or  penmen,  in  the  divine 
Hand,  and  every  sentence  and  word  being  put  into  the  text 
exactly  as  the  divine  Hand  through  these  instruments  placed 
it  there.  But  this  is  not  the  universal,  if,  indeed,  it  be  a  gen- 
eral view.  Most  Protestants  recognize  the  fact  tbat  there  is 
also  a  distinct  human  element,  a  discernible  human  factor,  in 
the  composition  of  the  Scriptures  ;  they  see  the  personality 
of  the  writers  as  well  as  the  voice  of  God  in  what  is  written. 
Protestantism  also  recognizes  the  great  underlying  fact 
that  inspiration  is  not  a  single  or  simple  but  a  very  com- 
plex and  multiform  process,  concerning  itself  sometimes 


18  THE  INAUGUEAL  ADDKESS  OF 

with  general  superintendence  of  what  is  recorded,  some- 
times exhibiting  itself  in  the  form  of  spiritual  elevation, 
and  in  some  portions  of  Scripture,  though  not  in  all, 
making  itself  visible  in  what  is  nothing  less  than  direct 
or  verbal  dictation,  word  after  word  dropping  immediately 
as  from  the  lips  of  God. 

But  while  Protestants  difier  among  themselves  as  to  the 
relative  prominence  and  proportion  of  these  varieties  of  in- 
spiration, evangelical  Protestantism  holds  fast  by  two 
things :  First,  that  the  original  cause  and  author  of  the 
Bible  as  a  book  is  not  man,  but  God  ;  and,  therefore,  that 
all  merely  naturalistic  conceptions  of  it,  all  handling  of  it 
as  if  it  were  a  Jewish  literature  merely,  all  interpreting  of 
it  as  if  it  were  composed  by  men,  is  a  crime  against  God  as 
its  author.  And  secondly  :  That  this  primal  divine  agency 
was  immediately  concerned  with  the  form,  the  language 
and  expression,  as  well  as  with  the  substance  of  the 
Book,   viewed    as    a    revelation.*      It    is    at    the    latter 

*  A  good  statement  of  the  common  Protestant  view  may  be  found  in 
the  apologetic  treatise  of  the  revered  theologian  and  teacher,  Henry 
Boynton  Smith  :  that  divine  influence  by  virtue  of  which  the  truths  and 
facts  given  by  Revelation,  as  well  as  other  truths  and  facts  pertaining 
to  the  Kingdom  of  God,  are  spoken  w  written  in  a  truthful  and  authori- 
tative manner.  In  the  same  treatise  this  author  presents  another  defini- 
tion :  Inspiration  gives  us  a  book  properly  called  the  Word  of  God,  in- 
spired in  all  its  parts.  This  inspiration  is  plenary  in  the  sense  of  extend- 
ing to  all  the  parts,  and  of  extending  also  to  the  words.  This  seems  to  be 
the  position  of  Dr.  Briggs  himself  in  his  interesting  volume  on 
American  Preshyterianism,  pp.  6-7,  and  also  in  his  work  on  Messianic 
Prophecy.  Lee  defines  inspiration  as  that  actuating  energy  of  the 
Holy  Ghost  which  guided  the  prophets  and  apostles  in  officially  pro- 
claiming the  will  of  God  by  word  of  mouth,  and  in  committing  to 
writing  the  several  portions  of  the  Bible. 

Some  writers  on  the  subject  (for  example,  Drs.  Hodge  and  Warficld, 
Presbyt.  Review,  April,  1881)  would  claim  more  than  this,  yet  they  would 
doubtless  accept  this  as  being  the  most  essential  truth  in  the  matter. 
They  do  not  bind  themselves  to  the  old  theory  of  an  absolute  verbal 


EEV.   CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,    LL.D.  19 

point  that  the  doctrine  of  the  address  seems  seriously 
defective.  The  learned  Professor  avers  that  there  is  noth- 
ing divine  in  the  letters,  words,  clauses,  or  style  of  the  text, 
— that  the  relation  of  God  to  the  Book  appears  simply  in 
the  giving  of  certain  concepts,  and  that  the  embodiment  of 
these  concepts  in  human  speech  is  simply  the  act  of  the 
men  who  received  them.  And  this  he  presents  as  an  ade- 
quate account  of  inspiration. 

But  what  is  a  concept  ?  Waiving  the  general  definition 
of  the  term,  which  is  inadequate  here,^  a  concept  must  in 
this  connection  be  simply  some  thought  or  impression  con- 
veyed to  the  mind  by  God  without  being  embodied  in  lan- 
guage— some  suggestion  respecting  spiritual  things  divinely 
communicated  to  certain  persons  preternaturally  qualified 
to  receive  such  suggestion  without  the  medium  of  words. 
It  is  a  grave  question  in  psychology  whether  a  thought,  an 
idea,  can  exist  in  the  human  mind  in  this  disembodied  Con- 
or mechanical  dictation  throughout,  as  their  interesting  and  able  treat- 
ise clearly  shows.  Dr.  Charles  Hodge  directly  rejects  the  mechanical 
theory.  "The  Church  has  never  held  what  has  been  stigmatized  as 
the  mechanical  theory  of  inspiration.  The  sacred  writers  were  not 
machines,  etc."  Syst.  TkeoL,  I.,  157.  See  his  definition  of  the  term, 
plenary  inspiration,  I.,  165. 

*  In  philosophic  usage  the  term  is  defined  (Century  Diet.)  as  a  gen- 
eral notion,  or  an  immediate  object  of  thought  in  simple  apprehen- 
sion, or  ( Webster)  an  abstract  general  conception.  Coleridge  defines 
conception  as  a  conscious  act  of  the  understanding,  bringing  some 
given  object  or  impression  into  the  mind  in  certain  relations  to  other 
objects,  and  the  concept  is  the  product  of  such  conscious  action.  Kant 
(Critique)  says  that  the  understanding  is  the  faculty  of  thinking,  and 
thinking  is  knowledge  by  means  of  concepts.  Hamilton  {Logic)  says 
that  in  the  forming  of  concepts  or  general  notions  the  mind  Compares, 
disjoins,  or  conjoins  attributes.  A  concept  is  clear  when  its  object  as 
a  whole  can  be  distinguished  from  any  other:  it  is  distinct  when  its 
several  parts  can  be  distinguished  from  each  other  (Fleming,  Vocab. 
Phil.).  These  definitions  clearly  imply  the  necessary  use  of  language 
fn  the  formation  as  in  the  description  of  our  concepts. 


,20  THE  INAUGURAL  ADDEESS   OF 

dition,  yet  no  one  can  deny  that  for  such  a  purpose  as  the 
creation  of  Scripture  God  might  empower  certain  minds  to 
discern  and  receive  truth  without  the  help  of  language. 
But  if  this  be  granted,  is  it  not  clear  that  this  peculiar 
process  is  not  inspiration,  but  revelation  ?  Are  not  two 
things  which  are  very  different  confused  here,  the  impart- 
ing of  knowledge  and  the  recording  of  it?  Inspiration  is, 
in  fact,  the  recording  of  revelations  previously  received, 
and  of  whatever  else  is  essential  to  the  proper  apprehending 
of  these  revelations.  Is  this  act  of  recording  one  in  which 
God  concerns  Himself,  or  is  it  the  act  of  men,  who  are 
constantly  exposed  to  such  mistakes  or  defects  as  are  inci- 
dent to  human  fallibility,  so  that  the  record  becomes  at  last 
only  their  account  of  certain  concepts  which  God  once 
gave  them  ?  How  can  their  account  have  any  authority  for 
us,  unless  we  have  reason  to  believe  that  they  were  divinely 
empowered,  divinely  guided,  not  merely  in  receiving,  but 
also  in  describing  their  concepts  and  transmitting  them  to 
the  world  ?  If  there  is  no  distinct,  positive,  theopneustic 
element  or  process  in  such  description  and  transmission, 
what  does  the  result  become  tons  but  an  inadequate  human 
communication,  void  of  all  spiritual  authoritativeness  ? 
And  when  the  whole  case  is  further  obscured  by  bringing 
the  matter  of  authorship  into  doubt  as  to  name  and  date, 
conditions  and  purpose,  and  by  affirming  that  on  all  these 
contributory  points  the  great  mass  of  the  Old  Testament, 
for  example,  is  substantially  a  terra  incognita^  what  real 
weight  can  we  attach  to  such  a  communication  as  a  true 
message  from  God  ? 

But  further :  the  Bible  is  not  a  mere  series  of  reported 
concepts;  it  is  also  a  history,  a  biography,  a  ritual  and 
psalmody,  a  collection  of  prophecies,  a  statement  of  doc- 
trines, a  law,  a  transcript  and  summary  of  human  duties,  a 
manual  on  character,  a  proclamation  of  grace,  a  way  of  life. 


EEV.   CHAELES   A.    BKIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  21 

The  concept  theory  furnishes  no  intelligible  explanation  of 
these  elements  in  Holy  Scripture — no  account  especially  as 
to  those  facts  and  declarations  of  the  Gospel  respecting 
which  what  we  need  is  a  clear,  faithful,  reliable  record. 
The  definition  gives  us,  for  example,  no  apprehensible  de- 
scription of  the  process  by  which  the  four  evangelists  set 
forth  in  detail  the  various  events,  acts,  teachings,  journeys, 
experiences,  in  the  life  of  our  blessed  Lord.  The  Book  of 
Acts  is  in  no  sense  whatever  a  book  of  concepts :  the  Pen- 
tecost was  an  event,  not  a  suggestion  conveyed  to  the  mind 
of  Luke  without  the  medium  of  words,  and  then  described 
by  him  in  such  language  as  he  could  command. 

Dr.  Briggs  finds  a  refuge  from  this  inevitable  conclusion 
by  introducing,  in  another  connection,  the  theory  of  a  gen- 
eral divine  superintendence,  which  is  exhibited  especially 
in  those  portions  of  the  Bible  that  are  biographic  or  his- 
toric— those  which  deal  with  what  he  regards  as  the  circum- 
stantials rather  than  essentials  of  the  divine  revelation. 
After  averring  in  strong  terms  that  errors  do  in  fact  exist 
in  these  portions,  although  such  superintendence  has  been 
exercised  over  them,  he  proceeds  to  define  this  superintend- 
ence in  the  following  words:  "It  may  be  that  this  provi- 
dential superintendence  gives  infallible  guidance  in  every 
particular ;  and  it  may  be  that  it  differs  but  little,  if  at  all, 
from  the  providential  superintendence  of  the  fathers  and 
schoolmen  and  theologians  of  the  Christian  Church."  This 
certainly  is  no  sufficient  explanation.  Have  we  not  a  right 
to  ask,  with  great  earnestness,  whether  so  colorless  and  in- 
ert a  concept  as  this  has  any  title  to  a  place  among  legiti- 
mate theories  of  inspiration  ?  Is  it  true  that  there  is  no 
distinction  which  is  discernible  and  vital  between,  for  ex- 
ample, the  inspiration  of  the  four  narratives  respecting 
Christ,  where  the  theory  of  imparted  concepts  cannot  be 
applied,  and  that  gracious  aid  and  guidance  which  ordinary 


22  THE  INAUGURAL  ADDRESS  OF 

believers  enjoy  ?     Under  such  a  statement,  what  is  inspira- 
tion except  an  uncertain  name  ? 

The  conclusion  of  the  matter,  according  to  the  common 
verdict  of  Protestantism,  is  that  inspiration,  as  a  divine 
process,  must  concern  itself,  not  with  the  reception  only, 
but  also  and  specially  with  the  impartation  of  divine  truth, 
and,  therefore,  that  it  cannot  exist  in  any  other  form  than 
in  connection  with  language.  To  maintain,  under  whatever 
plausible  theory,  that  the  language  introduced  is  the  contri- 
bution of  man  only,  is  either  to  destroy  inspiration  alto- 
gether or  to  make  of  it  a  speculative  fiction  with  which  the 
Christian  mind,  seeking  for  some  true  and  valid  foundation 
for  its  faith,  can  never  be  satisfied.  In  this  position  all 
evangelical  schools  and  grades  of  opinion,  however  widely 
they  may  divide  in  their  definitions,  are  heartily  agreed. 
Plenary  inspiration,  all  will  affirm,  is  an  inspiration  of  lan- 
guage as  truly  as  of  thought. 

INEKEANOY. 

We  are  now  brought  to  another  problem  vitally  connected 
with  the  two  preceding  topics — the  problem  of  Inerrancy. 
Here  again  we  are  in  need  of  careful  definition  and  dis- 
crimination. The  term  is  employed  by  the  author  as  if  it 
could  refer  only  to  the  biographic  and  historic  portions  of 
the  Bible,  to  the  circumstantials,  but  not  the  essentials. 
But  I  can  discern  no  reason  in  the  nature  of  the  case  why, 
^f  there  be  errors  scattered  through  the  narratives  and  his- 
tories of  Scripture,  there  may  not  be  errors,  all  the  more 
dangerous  because  we  cannot  so  easily  discover  them,  in 
the  statements  made  by  fallible  men  in  fallible  language 
respecting  the  concepts  which  God  gave  them  as  to  the 
principles,  the  laws,  the  doctrines,  the  most  essential  and 
saving  elements  in  His  revelation.*     The  proper  definition 

*  If  the  sacred  writers  have  made  mistakes  in  the  circumstantials  of 


REV.   CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  23 

of  the  term  inerrancy  is  not  exactness,  but  accuracy — free- 
dom or  exemption  from  error.  It  does  not  imply  that  each 
sacred  writer  told  the  whole  story  of  that  which  he  describes, 
but  simply  that  he  was  accurate  in  what  he  did  record. 
Nor  does  it  imply  that  there  must  always  be  a  verbal  par- 
allelism, as  in  the  case  of  quotations  from  the  older  Scrip- 
tures, if  the  real  sense  and  teaching  of  the  passage  quoted 
are  given.  Nor  does  it  require  verbal  exactness  at  every 
point,  as  in  the  case  of  the  four  differing  inscriptions  re- 
ported by  the  four  evangelists  as  ha\nng  been  placed  above 
the  head  of  the  crucified  Christ.  Neither  does  it  demand 
that  an  exact  historical  order  shall  be  preserved  when,  as  in 
the  narrative  of  the  temptation  of  our  Lord,  the  substance 
of  the  impressive  fact  is  truly  related.  Variations  in  the 
structure  of  a  story,  the  transposition  of  events,  changes  in 
the  order  of  a  narrative,  repetitions  of  the  same  event  in 
different  form  or  connection,  are  by  no  means  inconsistent 
with  a  true  and  plenary  and  inerrant  inspiration.  Still  less 
is  it  necessary  that  now,  after  so  many  centuries  of  possible 
inadvertence  in  transcription  and  otherwise,  we  should  be 
able,  under  conditions  so  changed,  to  discern  in  every  detail 
the  circumstantial  harmony  which  may  have  been  entirely 
manifest  to  those  who  first  heard  or  read  the  sacred  story. 


Scripture  where  accuracy  is  comparatively  easy,  the  natural  pre- 
sumption is  that  they  fell  into  mistakes  in  dealing  with  those  more 
essential  matters  where  accuracy  is  certainly  more  difficult,  and  where, 
it  may  be  added,  error  is  a  thousandfold  more  dangerous.  This  con- 
clusion cannot  be  avoided  except  by  the  assumption  that  in  the  record- 
ing of  these  essentials  they  were  inspired  in  a  special  sense  and  measure^ 
and  were  thereby  saved  from  the  mistakes  into  which  they  were  suf- 
fered to  fall  in  their  historic  or  biographic  work.  But  this  assumption, 
with  all  that  it  implies,  is  certainly  open  to  very  serious  question.  It 
offers  to  us  a  Bible  some  parts  of  which  are  infallible,  while  others  are 
fallible,  but  gives  us  no  clue  or  key  by  which  we  can  distinguish  the 
first  class  from  the  second. 


24  THE  INAUGURAL  ADDRESS  OF 

It  certainly  is  enough  for  us  all  if,  at  this  distance  of  time 
and  place,  we  are  satisfied  that  the  Bible  is  exempt  from 
any  and  all  error  which  would  in  any  way  impair  its  claim 
to  be  an  adequate  and  trustworthy  revelation  from  God. 

I  may  allude  in  passing  to  a  singular  logomachy  which 
has  arisen  at  this  point  respecting  the  original  manuscripts 
of  the  books  of  the  Bible.  On  one  side  it  is  afiirmed  that 
if  we  could  but  examine  these  original  manuscripts,  we 
should  find  them  absolutely  free  from  each  and  every  form 
of  error  or  discrepancy.  Admitting  that  certain  discrep- 
ancies and  errors  are  found  in  the  copies  of  these  manu- 
scripts that  have  been  preserved  for  us,  this  party  would 
maintain  that  everything  of  this  sort  must  have  crept  in  at 
some  later  date.  On  the  other  side  it  is  affirmed  that  there 
are  some  of  these  errors  and  discrepancies  which  cannot 
be  explained  through  mistake  in  transcription  or  obscura- 
tion of  time  or  any  other  like  cause — which  must  have 
been  in  the  original  manuscripts  at  the  outset.  The  first 
party  create  a  very  strong  presumption  in  their  favor  by 
pointing  to  God  as  the  author  of  the  Bible,  to  the  nature 
of  inspiration  as  a  process  in  which  the  minds  of  the 
writers  were  lifted  above  their  ordinary  exposure  to  mis- 
take, to  the  general  testimony  of  Scripture  in  favor  of  its 
own  inerrancy,  and  to  its  avowed  aim  and  purpose  as  an  in- 
fallible guide  to  everlasting  life.  The  second  party  create  an 
opposing  presumption  drawn  from  the  numerous  instances 
where  discrepancy  or  error  appear  in  our  present  copies 
which  cannot  be  explained  on  any  theory  of  subsequent 
changes,  but  must,  as  they  affirm,  have  existed  in  the 
original  writings. 

For  myself  I  frankly  say  that  the  first  presumption 
seems  far  stronger  than  the  second  ;  and  the  fact  that  I  am 
unable  to  remove  the  latter  by  any  explanatory  process 
does  not  compel  me  to  abandon  the  first.     If  I  must  make 


EEV.   CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  25 

either  affirmation,  I  deliberately  prefer  the  position  of  in- 
errancy, however  serious  the  difficulties  that  confront  me 
from  the  second  quarter.  But  have  I  a  right  to  require 
that  other  Christian  minds  shall  take  the  same  position  at 
the  peril  of  being  counted  as  disloyal  to  Holy  Writ  if  they 
refuse  ?  On  the  other  hand,  have  they  any  right  to  enforce 
their  presumption  of  errancy  upon  me?  When  we  re- 
member that  the  oldest  extant  copy  of  the  Old  Testament 
is  less  than  a  thousand  years  old,  and  at  least  fourteen  or 
fifteen  centuries  more  recent  than  the  date  of  the  latest 
portions  of  this  earlier  half  of  Scripture, — that  the  oldest 
copies  of  the  New  Testament  belong  at  the  farthest  to  the 
fourth  or  fifth  century  of  the  Christian  era, — that  all  these 
books  were  preserved  for  many  hundred  years  on  parch- 
ment or  linen  by  the  slow  process  of  copying,  often  by 
ignorant  and  incompetent  hands,  and  sometimes  by  those 
who  sought  to  improve  the  original  text, — and  that  all  the 
ancient  versions  and  other  helps  to  the  proper  understand- 
ing of  those  originals  have  passed  through  the  same  process 
and  themselves  bear  the  same  marks  of  present  imperfection, 
why  under  such  conditions  should  we  disturb  one  another 
with  sharp  controversy  over  something  which  we  have 
never  seen  or  can  see,  and  which  none  of  us  can  ever  ad- 
duce as  decisive  proof  of  the  accuracy  of  his  individual 
presumption  in  the  case  ?  Can  any  authoritative  theory  of 
inspiration  be  builded  up  on  either  of  these  hypotheses  ? 
And  does  not  the  controversy,  as  we  now  behold  it,  seem 
to  possess  all  the  elements  of  an  interminable,  and  perchance 
a  mischievous,  logomachy  ?  * 

*  It  seems  to  be  supposed  by  the  advocates  of  the  absolute  inerrancy 
of  the  original  Scriptures  in  every  minute  detail,  that  their  view  is  sus- 
tained in  some  way  by  the  creed  of  our  Church.  The  plain  fact 
is,  that  there  is  not  a  single  sentence  or  phrase  in  our  Confession  (or, 
indeed,  in  any  Protestant  Symbol,)  by  which  a  man  could  be  con- 


26  THE  INAUGURAL  ADDRESS  OF 

On  the  other  hand,  I  have  been  led,  after  some  examina- 
tion of  the  matter,  to  suspect  that  some  of  the  bibhcal 
critics,  in  their  effort  to  maintain  a  particular  opinion  as  to 
inspiration,  have  made  much  more  than  the  facts  warrant, 
or  than  is  prudent  in  Christian  men,  of  existing  discrepan- 
cies in  the  Bible.  The  existence  of  such  discrepancies  is 
not  to  be  denied.  Yet  ought  not  this  fact  to  be  so  stated 
that  it  shall  not  seriously  disturb  our  faith  ?  When  our 
Confession  (chap.  i.  8)  declares  that  the  Sacred  Books 
have  by  the  singular  care  and  providence  of  God  been 
kept  pure  in  all  ages,  this  does  not  imply  that  copyists  and 
translators  were,  like  the  original  authors,  inspired  or  were 
miraculously  kept  from  error.  The  wonder  of  thoughtful 
minds  is  that  a  book  which  required  fifteen  centuries  for  its 
formation,  by  many  writers  in  several  languages,  and  under 
most  diverse  conditions,  should  after  its  completion  and 
compilation  have  passed  through  so  many  exposm*es  and 
been  transmitted  through  processes  so  likely  to  impair  its 
original  statements,  and  at  last  should  have  come  down  to 
us  after  eighteen  centuries  so  free  from  serious  error  on 
any  essential  point  of  doctrine  or  duty,  so  void  of  contra- 
dictions or  even  of  important  historic  discrepancies,  that 
we  have  no  difficulty  in  receiving  and  embracing  it  as  in 
its  totality  the  very  Word  of  God.     Whatever  may  have 

vlcted  of  heresy  who  should  aflSrm  that  in  his  judgment  there  were 
errors  of  this  class  iu  some  of  the  books  of  Scripture  as  originally 
written.  Our  creed  is  much  less  specific  on  this  point  than  is  com- 
monly supposed — much  less,  in  fact,  than  is  the  general  belief  of  the 
Church  itself  in  our  time.  The  doctrine  of  inspiration,  as  most  of  us 
hold  it,  is  an  historic  growth,  subsequent  to  the  Westminster  Assembly, 
and,  indeed,  chiefly  within  this  century.  In  condemning  departures 
from  that  doctrine,  it  is  well  to  remember  that  we  as  Presbyterians 
can  go  no  farther  ecclesiastically  than  our  own  Confession  warrants ; 
later  opinion,  however  current,  is  not  a  constitutional  basis  for  dis- 
cipline. 


REV.   CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  27 

been  its  exact  original  form,  whatever  the  changes  and 
vicissitudes  to  which  it  has  been  subject  through  the  cen- 
turies, and  whatever  questions  may  be  started  as  to  the  best 
way  of  explaining  some  perplexities  which  here  and  there 
arise  in  our  study  of  it,  we  may  reverently  accept  it  with- 
out any  soHcitude  as  being  an  inerrant  revelation,  entirely 
adequate  to  guide  us  and  all  men  from  earth  to  heaven. 

How  shall  we  as  Christian  men  treat  such  discrepancies 
as  do  in  fact  appear  in  the  present  Scriptures?  At  the 
outset  it  would  seem  to  be  our  duty  to  guard  ourselves 
against  the  serious  mistake  of  endeavoring,  under  the  influ- 
ence of  a  desire  to  build  up  one  theory  of  inspiration  or 
to  throw  down  another  theory,  to  magnify  this  admitted 
difficulty,  whether  by  enlarging  the  number  of  such  dis- 
crepancies or  by  emphasizing  their  importance.  If  the 
critic  should  find  a  thousand  of  them  in  the  Bible  as  he 
has  it,  he  could  never  prove  that  any  given  number,  or 
even  any  single  one  of  them,  was  actually  in  the  original 
manuscripts,  and  therefore  he  could  never  prove  by  this 
process  that  the  original  Scriptures  were  not  inerrant.  He 
might  create  a  presumption  against  their  inerrancy,  but  his 
argument  would  be  a  presumptive  argument  only,  and  the 
presumption  is  one  which  he  could  not  present  as  a  sufficient 
basis  for  a  theory  of  inspiration,  or  a  conclusive  key  to 
biblical  interpretation,  or  for  which  he  could  claim  the  ap- 
proval of  other  minds.  And  may  it  not  be  seriously  asked 
here  whether  the  motive  that  inspires  him,  right  enough  in 
itself,  really  justifies  a  procedm-e  which  has  in  it,  as  all  can 
see,  so  many  elements  of  danger  to  the  conmion  faith? 
What  truth  would  be  brought  out,  what  doctrine  made 
clearer,  what  duty  more  strongly  enforced,  by  such  an  ac- 
cunmlation  of  actual  or  possible  defects  discovered  or  sup- 
posed to  be  discovered  in  the  written  "Word  ?  Why,  for  ex- 
ample, should  Dr.  Briggs  desire  first  to  reduce  the  doctrine 


28  THE  IlSrAUGUEAL   ADDRESS   O:? 

of  inspiration  into  a  peculiarly  speculative,  slender,  evanes- 
cent form,  and  then  make  sucli  inspiration  still  more  intan- 
gible and  dubious  by  emphasizing  so  strongly  the  errancies 
and  aberrations  of  Scripture  ?  How  is  the  Biblical  Theol- 
ogy, of  which  he  is  the  elect  representative,  to  be  aided  by 
showing  that  the  Book  from  which  it  is  derived  is  marred 
by  multiform  errors  ? 

We  may  learn  a  practical  lesson  here  from  the  great 
English  apologists  of  the  last  century,  Leslie,  Warburton, 
Leland,  and  their  compeers.  No  critic  of  our  day,  German 
or  British  or  American,  could  bring  together  a  stronger 
array  of  discrepancies,  contradictions,  errors,  than  may  be 
found  in  the  writings  of  Toland,  Collins,  Woolston,  Tindal, 
Chubb,  and  their  associates  among  the  English  Deists  of 
that  dark  period.  Thomas  Paine  and  the  Age  of  Reason 
may  be  said  to  have  brought  their  malevolent  work  of 
aspersion  to  its  final  consummation.  But  the  noble  school 
of  apologists  to  whom  I  have  referred  gave  themselves  res- 
olutely to  the  task  of  answering  these  unworthy  aspersions 
upon  the  Bible,  of  explaining  the  alleged  errors,  of  dis- 
proving the  asserted  contradictious,  of  harmonizing  dis- 
crepancies wherever  this  was  possible,  and  of  showing  in 
general  that,  after  all,  the  Bible  was  a  true  revelation, 
worthy  of  universal  credence.  They  accepted  the  challenge 
of  Deism  on  every  field,  and  on  every  field  they  won  a 
decisive  victory  for  the  Divine  Word  and  for  the  common 
Christianity.  The  hostile  researches  of  another  century, 
the  investigations  and  incongruous  affirmations  of  the  Ger- 
man criticism,  the  speculative  problems  and  perplexities 
raised  in  various  quarters  since  their  day,  have  not  increased 
the  difficulty  of  like  defence  in  our  time ;  and,  on  the  other 
hand,  the  vdder  knowledge,  the  larger  scholarship,  and  bet- 
ter equipment  which  we  enjoy  make  the  conflict  and  the 
victory  more  easy  and  more  sure.     If  we  but  enter  upon 


EEV.   CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  29 

the  task  in  their  spirit  of  reverential  loyalty  to  the  Word, 
with  a  controlling  desire  to  make  the  least  rather  than  the 
most  of  every  difficulty,  we,  like  them,  shall  have  the  priv- 
ilege o^  seeing  sucli  difficulty  for  the  most  part  disappear. 

When  the  whole  matter  of  discrepancy  has  been  reduced 
to  its  lowest  dimensions  by  processes  of  analysis  and  ex- 
planation such  as  these,  it  may  be  reduced  still  further  by 
reference  to  the  lung  process  of  transcription  running 
through  many  centuries,  with  some  possibility  of  error  or 
corruption  at  every  stage.  Wliile  no  one  could  affirm  that 
all  discrepancy  can  be  explained  by  such  reference,  Chris- 
tian minds  will  generally  admit  that  very  much  can  be  so 
explained.  And  if  to  this  source  of  helpful  light  there  be 
added  the  historic  obscuration  that  has  come  through  the 
long  ages  upon  the  sacred  text,  rendering  inscrutable  to  us 
many  things  which  were  entirely  plain  to  those  who  lived 
when  the  text  was  written,  or  shortly  after,  we  have  an- 
other source  of  relief  from  perplexity,  of  probably  greater 
value  than  most  have  been  accustomed  to  suppose.  I  have 
an  impression  also  that  Higher  Criticism,  as  it  shall  advance 
into  the  stage  of  a  positive  and  matured  science,  will  be 
found  to  be  exceedingly  helpful  in  this  direction, — just  as 
Assyriology  and  Egyptology  are  already  explaining  many 
biblical  obscurities  and  confirming  our  faith  in  certain  his- 
torical parts  of  Scripture.  And  I  further  believe  in  my 
inmost  heart  that  by  these,  and  by  other  kindred  processes 
that  might  be  named,  this  whole  matter  of  errancy  can  be 
reduced  to  such  insignificant  dimensions  that  it  would  never 
unsettle  intelligent  faith  or  disturb  in  any  way  the  harmony 
of  the  Church.* 


*  Charles  Hodge;  Syst.  Theol,  vol.  i.,  151-170,  on  inspiration  and 
inen-ancy,  especially  pp.  169,  170,  on  the  way  of  regarding  and  treat- 
ing existing  discrepancies.    Also,  Lee  on  Inspiration,  especially  Lect. 


30  THE  INAUGURAL  ADDRESS   OF 


A  word  in  passing  with  regard  to  two  other  barriers 
which  Professor  Briggs  charges  the  theologians  with  hav- 
ing erected  against  the  new  science  of  Biblical  Theology, — 
false  views  of  Miracle  and  false  views  of  Projphecy.  The 
affirmations  of  the  address  on  the  first  point  are,  that  mira- 
cles are  of  less  moment  to  the  Christian  system  than  the 
modern  apologists  have  been  accustomed  to  maintain ;  that 
they  are  not  widely  diffused  through  the  Scriptures,  but 
are  limited  to  two  or  three  specific  periods  in  the  develop- 
ment of  the  scheme  of  grace ;  that  they  are  always  miracles 
of  redemption ;  that  they  are  wrought  chiefly  to  illustrate 
the  saving  love  of  Christ  and  the  process  of  our  salvation  ; 
that  nothing  would  be  lost  from  their  practical  value  if 
they  were  regarded  simply  as  extraordinary  acts  of  Provi- 
dence in  accordance  with  the  laws  of  nature ;  that  if  the 
miracles  of  Christ  could  be  explained  by  the  use  of  hypno- 
tism or  by  some  other  occult  natural  agency,  nothing  essen- 
tial would  be  lost  out  of  them ;  and  that  the  theories  of 
miracles  taught  in  the  Church  are  human  inventions  merely. 
The  .address  does  not  suggest  what  some  critics  are  now 
openly  affirming,  that  the  presence  of  miracle  in  the  Bible 
is  a  positive  difficulty  in  the  way  of  belief,  but  it  certainly 
makes  no  distinct  reference  to  that  grand  function  of  mira- 
cle as  an  evidential  adjunct  to  Scripture,  without  which  the 
explanation  and  defence  of  miracle  are  well-nigh  impos- 
sible. 

"What  is  a  miracle  ?  A  miracle  is  a  specific  act  produced 
within  the  sphere  of  nature  or  of  humanity,  not  by  any 


viii.  ;  H.  B.  Smith,  Introd.  to  Christ.  Tlieol.,  ch.  v.,  Part  II.,  III.  ; 
Shedd,  Syst.  TJieol.,  vol.  i.,  93-110.  "Minor  variations  are  not  incon- 
sistent with  plenary  inspiration.  .  .  .  They  are  also  compatible  with 
an  infallible  account." 


EEV.   CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  31 

occult  force  in  nature,  but  by  the  direct  efficiency  of  God, 
for  the  purpose  of  attesting  some  truth  or  promise,  or  of 
demonstrating  the  divine  authorship  of  some  scheme  or 
process  of  government  or  of  redemption.  It  is  not  import- 
ant here  to  state  the  proof  that  miracle  can  occur,  or  that 
such  occurrence  can  be  proved,  or  that  God  is  immediately 
in  every  miracle,  according  to  the  testimony  of  Scripture. 
But  it  is  important  to  say  that  miracles  are  very  widely 
diffused  through  the  Bible  ;  that,  especially  in  the  Old 
Testament,  they  are  often  miracles  of  pro%^deuce,  of  power 
and  authority,  or  of  retribution,  rather  than  of  grace ;  that 
while  they  do  in  many  cases  gloriously  illustrate  the  love 
of  the  Saviour  and  the  methods  by  which  the  soul  is  saved, 
they  are  always  represented  as  having  a  wider  attestational 
function  ;  and  that,  instead  of  being  obstructional  or  unim- 
portant, they  are  of  inestimable  moment  as  witnesses  to  the 
inspiration  and  the  authoritativeness  of  the  whole  Bible. 

PKOPHECT. 

Respecting  prophecy.  Dr.  Briggs  denies  that  it  consti- 
tutes in  any  direct  sense  a  history  before  the  time ;  he 
quotes  Kuenen  with  approval  as  having  shown  that  many 
Old  Testament  prophecies,  instead  of  having  come  to  pass, 
have  actually  been  reversed  by  history ;  he  affirms  for  him- 
self that  the  great  body  of  Messianic  prediction  not  only 
never  has  been,  but  cannot  now  or  at  any  time  in  the 
future  be  fulfilled.  He  does  not  side  directly  with  that 
school  of  criticism  which  is  now  inclined  to  hold  that  there 
is  in  fact  no  predictive  element  in  the  Old  Testament,  and 
that  the  prophets  were  simply  and  solely  religious  teachers, 
whose  strong  declarations  respecting  men  and  cities  and 
nations  have  been  entirely  misapprehended  by  the  modern 
Church.  But  the  illustration  which  he  adduces  as  an  in- 
stance of  unfulfilled  prophecy,  the  minatory  declai-ation  of 


32  THE  INAUGUEAL  ADDRESS  OF 

Jehovah  by  the  mouth  of  Joshua,  afterwards  modified  upon 
the  repentance  of  the  monarch  and  people  of  Nineveh,* 
shows  how  imperfect  and  how  injurious  in  some  aspects  his 
theory  of  prophecy  must  be.  We  have  only  to  analyze  the 
great  fact  of  prophecy  more  closely,  and  to  study  that  great 
fact  in  its  evidential  relation  to  Scripture,  to  see  just  where 
the  imperfection  and  the  injury  lie. 

It  is  true  that  the  Westminster  divines  made  no  refer- 
ence to  prophecy  or  miracle,  or  to  the  grand  attestational 
argument  drawn  from  the  history  of  the  Bible  and  from  its 
moral  influence,  in  their  list  of  the  evidences  by  which  the 
Book  certifies  itself  to  us  as  from  God.  This  is  an  obvious 
defect  in  their  Confession,  and  one  that  justifies  its  revision. 
But  this  defect  has  been  fully  made  up  by  the  apologists 
of  later  times,  and  the  combined  arguments  from  miracle 
and  prophecy  now  stand  out,  in  the  apprehension  of  Prot- 
estantism, as  an  impregnable  defence  of  Holy  Scripture. 
It  may  be  that  in  developing  this  composite  argument  some 
of  these  apologists  have  magnified  unduly  these  external 
defences,  but  certainly  it  is  now  too  late  for  any  intelligent 

*  To  quote  the  minatory  declaration  of  God  against  Nineveh,  taken 
in  connection  with  the  subsequent  repentance  of  the  people  and  the 
consequent  change  in  the  divine  dealing  with  them,  as  an  instance  of 
uufultilled  prediction,  certainly  involves  a  grave  misapprehension  of 
the  nature  and  function  of  prophecy.  To  draw  from  this  and  sim- 
ilar instances  in  the  Old  Testament  where  conditional  judgments  are 
threatened  but  afterwards  withheld,  the  inference  that  many  divine 
predictions  have  been  reversed  by  history,  is  a  still  more  serious  mistake. 
Respecting  the  affirmation  that  there  lies  embodied  in  the  brief  book 
of  Jonah  "  the  gospel  of  infant  salvation  and  the  gospel  of  heathen 
salvation,"  one  cannot  avoid  being  surprised,  whether  we  consider  it 
as  theology  or  as  exegesis.  How  much  more  impressive  is  the  pro- 
found remark  of  Edwards:  "Where  Scripture  History  fails,  there 
Prophecy  takes  its  place  ;  so  is  the  account  still  carried  forward,  and 
the  chain  is  not  broken  till  we  come  to  the  very  last  link — the  consum- 
mation of  all  things." 


KEY.    CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  33 

Protestant  to  decry  or  to  ignore  them.  The  inward  witness 
for  the  Word,  the  testimony  of  the  Christian  consciousness 
in  its  behalf,  precious  as  it  is,  can  nevermore  render  need- 
less this  subhme  external  testimony.  Surely,  surely,  it  is 
useless  to  disparage  miracle  so  long  as  the  transcendent 
story  of  the  resurrection  of  our  Lord,  the  crowning  miracle 
of  Christianity,  stands  unim peached  and  unimpeachable  on 
the  sacred  page.  And  as  for  prophecy,  so  long  as  Tyre 
stands  a  perished  city  by  the  sea  ;  so  long  as  many  centuries 
of  time  attest  the  truthfulness  of  the  solemn  predictions 
respecting  Egypt  and  Moab  and  Assyria ;  so  long  as  the 
numerous  and  explicit  predictions  of  the  Old  Testament 
concerning  Christ  are  so  clearly  verified  in  the  four  evan- 
gels ;  so  long  as  the  clear  prophecies  of  Christ  respecting 
His  own  death  and  resurrection,  respecting  the  destruction 
of  Jerusalem  and  the  dispersion  of  the  Jewish  people, 
respecting  the  development  and  progress  of  His  Gospel 
and  its  expanding  career  on  earth,  remain  imquestioned  in 
the  Bible,  it  will  be  vain  to  depreciate  the  presence  or  the 
worth  of  prophecy  in  the  Christian  scheme.* 

BIBLICAL   AND    SYSTEMATIC   THEOLOGY. 

After  these  various  and  long  digressions  into  adjacent 
fields  of  thought,  we  have  now  come  to  the  main  and  the 
final  topic  in  this  important  address.  The  chief  aim  of  the 
author,  as  has  been  already  stated,  is  to  set  forth  the  nature 
and  claims  of  Biblical  Theology  as  a  science  worthy  of  a 
high  place  in  our  theological  curriculum.  In  order  to  se- 
cure recognition  for  this  new  science,  he  seems  to  think  it 
needful  to  disparage  Systematic  Theology  and  its  repre- 


*  On  the  worth  of  Miracles,  note  the  admirable  presentation  by 
Henry  B.  Smith,  Apologetics,  chap.  iv. ;  and  on  Prophecy  and  its  Ful- 
filment, see  his  Introduction,  pp.  162-167. 


34  THE  INAUGURAL  ADDEESS  OF 

sentatives  in  language  probably  never  before  applied  on 
such  an  occasion  in  such  a  way.  We  listen  in  wonder  to 
his  profuse  arraignment  of  these  representatives,  some  of 
whom  are  among  the  most  eminent  names  on  the  roll  of 
Protestantism.  They  are  not  only  theologians  and  apolo- 
gists and  theologizers,  but  also  dogmatists  and  dogmaticians ; 
the  scholastics  and  ecclesiastics  of  Protestantism  and  blind 
defenders  of  traditionalism ;  engaged  in  putting  up  barriers 
of  dogmatism  against  the  truth  ;  substituting  a  human  rule 
of  faith  for  the  authority  of  God  ;  shutting  out  the  light 
and  obstructing  the  life  of  God,  and  obtruding  themselves 
in  the  way  of  devout  seekers  after  God  ;  representatives  of 
priestcraft,  ceremonialism,  and  dead  orthodoxy ;  depreciat- 
ing the  Church  and  the  Eeason,  and  treating  even  the 
Bible  as  if  it  were  a  baby  ;  reasoning  falsely  in  a  circle  and 
yet  in  utter  unconsciousness,  while  they  thrust  their  fallacies 
and  deceits  in  the  face  of  other  men,  and  create  ghosts  of 
evangelicalism  to  frighten  children  ;  well-meaning  but  mis- 
guided, resting  in  their  own  conceits  and  follies  rather  than 
in  the  written  Word  ;  inculcating  a  hard  and  fast  system  of 
dogma  in  which  they  beg  their  premises  and  jump  at  their 
conclusions ;  exaggerating,  misunderstanding,  and  even  per- 
verting the  doctrines  of  Scripture ;  teaching  bugbears  and 
magical  transformations  and  other  conceits,  derived  from 
the  ethnic  religions,  without  any  basis  in  the  Bible  or 
Christian  experience  or  the  Christian  creeds ;  at  the  saaae 
time  culpably  neglecting  the  ethical  portions  of  both  the 
Old  and  the  New  Testaments,  and  especially  the  ethics  of 
Christ ;  and  so  on  and  on. 

The  science  of  Systematic  Theology,  justified  by  more 
than  three  centuries  of  healthful  development,  graced  by 
many  illustrious  names  from  Melancthon  and  Calvin  down 
to  the  honored  teachers  of  our  own  time,  dead  and  living, 
and  well  approved  by  the  Church  in  its  general  temper, 


REV.    CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  35 

principles,  processes,  and  results,  needs  no  eulogy  or  de- 
fence from  me.  That  it  is  yet  a  complete  science,  perfect 
in  all  its  methods  and  absolutely  secure  and  final  in  all  its 
conclusions,  no  wise  representative  of  it  would  claim.  That 
some  of  its  representatives  have  been  prone  to  follow 
precedent  rather  than  Scripture,  to  rest  too  much  in  phi- 
losophical or  metaphysical  reasonings,  to  fabricate  systems 
too  largely  from  their  own  fancy,  and  so  to  diverge  over- 
much from  the  straight  line  of  biblical  teaching  and  bib- 
lical authority,  no  one  ought  to  deny.  But  that  it  is  a  real 
science,  based  on  sound  principles  in  the  main,  prosecuted 
for  the  most  part  in  an  intelHgent  and  faithful  spirit,  and 
therefore  worthy  of  respect  from  considerate  men,  may  be 
safely  affirmed.  In  regard  to  this  singular  assault  upon 
this  science  and  its  representatives  at  such  an  inopportune 
time  and  place  I  propose  to  say  nothing  now  excepting 
this :  that  a  poorer  way  of  commending  a  new  science  and 
a  new  professorship  to  popular  sympathy  and  confidence 
could  not  possibly  have  been  invented.  And  the  attitude 
which  the  author  in  this  connection  assumes  for  himself  as 
the  elect  leader  of  another  theological  advance  or  crusade 
which  is  to  sweep  or  burn  away  all  this  dead  orthodoxy, 
this  effete  ecclesiasticism,  this  formal  morality,  and  to  in- 
troduce in  their  stead  a  new  life  and  a  new  age  in  theology 
and  in  Christian  experience — a  reformation  grander,  as  he 
assures  us,  than  that  of  the  sixteenth  century — is  neither 
diffident  nor  safe.  It  remains  to  be  seen  whether,  in 
famihar  phrase,  the  vigor  and  success  of  the  war  will  at 
all  equal  the  sounding  phrases  of  the  manifesto.* 

*  One  who  has  the  privilege  of  teaching  theology  in  the  systematic 
form  would  be  culpable,  if  he  should  allow  these  reflections  in  his 
favorite  pursuit  to  warp  in  the  least  degree  his  estimate  of  the  interest 
and  the  value  attaching  to  this  new  science  of  Biblical  Theology. 
He  should  rather  welcome  it  as  a  mode  of  presenting  in  fresh  and  in 


as  THE  INAUGUEAL  ADDRESS  OF 


BIBLICAL   THEOLOGY   DEFINED. 

Dr.  Briggs  defines  Biblical  Theology,  which  stands  in  his 
apprehension  so  far  above  Systematic  Theology,  as  the  The- 
ology of  the  Bible.  This  is  a  promising  phrase,  but  rather 
too  general  and  vague  to  be  useful.  In  the  Appendix  he 
further  defines  it  as  that  theological  discipline  which  pre- 
sents the  theology  of  the  Bible  in  its  historical  formation 
within  the  sacred  writings.  He  again  describes  it  as  Bib- 
lical Dogmatics, — that  part  of  dogmatics  which  rests  upon 
the  Bible  and  derives  its  material  from  the  Bible  by  the 
legitimate  use  of  its  principles.  Is  there  not  in  these  defi- 
nitions a  half-concealed  assumption  of  special  scriptural- 
ness,  of  a  higher  and  purer  biblical  quality  than  is  to  be 
found  in  Systematic  Theology  ?  Dr.  Shedd  tells  us  {Dog- 
Tnatic  Theol.,  i.,  12-15)  that  the  biblical,  like  the  systematic 
method  of  theologizing,  may  construct  a  biblical  or  an  un- 
biblical  book,  an  evangelical  or  a  rationalistic  treatise,  a 
theistic  or  a  pantheistic  scheme.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  he 
says,  all  varieties  of  orthodoxy  and  of  heterodoxy  may  be 
found  within  this  new  department,  and  he  points  us  to 
Germany  for  the  evidence.  And  then  he  shrewdly  adds  : 
As  we  have  to  ask  respecting  systematic  theology  whose  the- 
ology it  is,  so  also  in  regard  to  biblical  theology  we  must 

some  respects  specially  efifective  ways,  the  Truth  of  God.  To  study 
thoughtfully  and  as  separate  from  all  other,  the  theology  of  some  man 
like  John  or  Peter  or  Paul,  or  the  theology  of  some  single  epistle 
like  the  Galatian  or  the  Ephesian,  or  some  group  of  epistles  like  the 
Pastoral,  is  in  itself  a  most  delightful  task,  and  one  which  the  writer 
from  a  long  experience  would  heartily  commend,  especially  to  the 
younger  ministers  of  our  Church.  They  will  not  be  likely  to  find 
much  new  truth,  but  they  will  discern  the  old  truths  in  fresher  form 
and  coloring,  and  perhaps  in  greater  attractiveness.  How  such  a 
study  can  be  at  variance  with  Systematic  Theology,  it  is  hard  for  a 
plain  mind  to  conceive. 


BEV.   CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  37 

ask  whose  biblical  tlieolof^y  it  is.  On  bis  authority  we 
may,  therefore,  conclude  that  biblical  theology  is  not  more 
biblical  by  necessity  than  systematic  theology  is.  In  this 
instance  what  we  have  are  simply  the  opinions  of  Professor 
Briggs,  after  the  most  thorough  examination  which  he  can 
give  respecting  the  doctrinal  contents  of  this  or  that  book, 
or  the  personal  teachings  of  this  or  that  inspired  writer,  or 
the  general  doctrine  found  b}'  him  in  some  broader  division 
of  the  Bible,  or  in  the  Bible  as  a  whole.  What  now  are 
these  opinions,  as  presented  in  this  address? 

BIBLICAL   THEOLOGY   CONCERNING   GOD. 

Passing  by  what  is  said  in  a  suggestive  way  respecting 
the  theophanies  and  institutions  of  the  Old  Testament,  and 
of  the  religious  system  of  the  Hebrews,  we  come  at  once 
upon  his  exposition  of  the  contents  of  the  Bible  under  the 
three  main  heads :  God,  Man,  Kedemption.  Under  the 
first  head  he  remarks  that  a  new  doctrine  of  God,  high 
above  the  most  skilful  constructions  of  the  systematic  the- 
ologians, is  one  of  the  greatest  needs  of  our  time.  He 
proceeds  further  to  say  that  we  do  not  need  a  Bible  to 
teach  us  that  God  is  just ;  that  the  favorite  attribute  of  the 
Bible  is  mercy  ;  that  all  our  creeds  and  systems  of  divinity 
exaggerate  the  divine  justice,  and  indicate  a  fear  lest  God 
should  be  regarded  as  too  merciful ;  and  that  the  love  of 
God  for  the  world  will  shine  out  as  the  one  great  truth  for 
man  to  know  when  all  the  creeds  and  theologies  shall  have 
been  buried  (so  he  prophesies)  in  the  obhvion  of  the 
eternities.  As  we  calmly  weigh  these  sentences,  we  fall  at 
once  to  wondering  whether  we  are  really  getting  something 
new  and  lofty  beyond  all  antecedent  conceptions  of  the 
Deity,  or  are  listening  to  an  old  half-truth  stated  in  fresh 
and  rather  oracular  form.  What  on  this  view  is  to  become 
of  all  those  portions  of  the  Old  Testament  (from  which 


38  THE  INAUGURAL   ADDRESS   OF 

the  tlieologj  of  the  author  seems  to  be  very  largely  drawn) 
which  tell  us  so  frequently  and  impressively  of  the  holy 
sovereignty  of  God, — of  His  law  and  commandments, 
His  righteous  administration,  His  faithful  warnings  against 
sin,  His  holy  judgments.  His  terrible  retributions?  Do 
we  not  need  the  Bible  to  tell  us  of  all  this,  as  well  as  to 
set  forth  the  divine  mercy  ?  How  can  that  mercy  be  com- 
prehended at  all  except  in  its  relations  to  the  divine  justice  ? 
And  is  Biblical  Theology  to  devote  itself  simply  to  the  ex- 
position and  collation  of  one  among  the  divine  attributes, 
while  ignoring  or  counting  as  secondary  all  the  rest? 
"Where  in  such  a  theology  as  is  proposed  do  we  find  room 
for  the  fundamental  doctrine  of  the  moral  or  even  the  prov- 
idential government  of  God ;  and  how  can  we  on  such  a 
basis  explain  the  impressive  facts  of  His  administration,  or 
interpret  His  imperative  and  holy  statutes,  or  join  with 
patriarchs  and  psalmists  and  prophets  in  those  solemn  as- 
criptions of  praise  and  adoration  which  sound  magnificent, 
like  organ  peals,  through  the  older  Scriptures  ? 

I  have  been  accustomed  to  think  that  our  own  well- 
poised  and  comprehensive  Confession,  when  it  (chap,  i.,  1) 
describes  God  on  one  hand  as  "  most  loving,  gracious,  mer- 
ciful, long-suffering,  abundant  in  goodness  and  truth,  for- 
giving iniquity,  transgression,  and  sin,  and  the  rewarder  of 
them  that  dihgently  seek  Him,"  and  then  describes  Him 
on  the  other  hand  as  "most  wise,  most  holy,  most  free, 
most  absolute,  working  all  things  according  to  the  counsel 
of  His  most  righteous  will ;  also  most  just  and  terrible  in 
His  judgments  and  hating  all  sin,"  presents  us  with  a 
thoroughly  biblical  view  of  God,  the  result  of  a  profound 
study  of  His  Word,  not  in  a  few  passages  here  and  there, 
but  throughout,  and  therefore  worthy  of  universal  accept- 
ance among  Christians  substantially  as  it  stands.  Individ- 
ual theologians  and  some  schools  of  Calvinistic  theology 


REV.   CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  39 

may  have  enipliasized  overmuch  the  severer  side  of  this 
hiblical  portraiture,  and  there  is  ground  for  the  general 
admission  that  the  Confession  itself,  in  its  subsequent  ap- 
plication of  the  doctrine,  has  not  sufficiently  kept  in  de- 
served prominence  the  love  of  God  for  the  world,  and  the 
sincerity  and  fullness  of  His  desire  that  all  men  should 
come  back  to  Him  in  penitence  and  faith.*  But  notwith- 
standing such  facts,  we  may  still  present  this  portraiture 
not  merely  as  one  that  is  worthy  of  universal  acceptance, 
but  one  that  in  its  essence  is  practically  recognized  by  evan- 
gelical minds  of  every  name  as  a  fuU  and  sound  and  un- 
questionable deduction  from  what  the  Bible,  and  the  whole 
Bible,  teaches  on  this  subject. 

Biblical  Theology  can  do  no  better  than  to  accept,  not 
the  favorite  attribute  of  mercy  alone,  but  the  essential 
attribute  of  justice,  and  all  the  other  attributes  and  perfec- 
tions of  the  Deity  also,  and  endeavor  to  blend  the  whole  in 
one  harmonious,  sublime,  glorious,  and  most  winning  con- 
cept of  Him  in  all  that  makes  Him  God  over  all,  blessed 

*  It  is  a  suggestive  fact  in  this  connection  that  a  very  large  propor- 
tion of  the  Presbyteries  of  our  Church  have  recently  petitioned  the 
General  Assembly  for  such  changes  in  our  Confession  as  shall  bring 
this  grand  doctrine  more  fully  into  view,  and  that  the  General  Assem- 
bly has  recognized  the  propriety  of  the  petition,  and  has  made  pro- 
vision to  secure  the  improvement  desired.  But  it  is  also  a  suggestive 
fact  that  many  of  these  Presbyteries  have  expressed  their  earnest  wish 
that  in  making  this  change  nothing  should  be  introduced  into  the 
Confession  that  would  in  any  way  impair  the  great  antithetic  doctrine 
of  the  justice  and  holy  sovereignty  of  God,  and  the  General  Assembly 
has  declared  that  nothing  of  this  sort  shall  be  allowed.  It  may  be 
inferred  that  the  Presbyterian  Church  with  which  we  are  identified 
intends  to  hold  not  one  part  of  the  truth,  but  the  whole  ti-uth,  on  this 
subject,  and  will  repudiate  any  narrower  view  from  cither  quarter. 
And  what  is  true  of  our  own  Church  is  true,  so  far  as  appears,  of  the 
Presbyterians  of  England  and  Scotland  and  elsewhere.  There  are  no 
signs  anywhere  of  a  disposition  to  abandon  the  distinctive  principles 
of  Calvinism. 


40  THE  INAUGURAL   ADDRESS  OF 

forever.  "When  it  has  done  this,  it  will  not  find  itself  very 
far  removed  from  the  existing;  doctrine  as  set  forth  in  our 
own  creed  and  in  the  symbols  of  Protestantism  generally, 
and  as  explahied  in  our  best  current  theologies.  But  if 
Biblical  Theology  proposes  to  itself  to  push  into  the  back- 
ground one  side  of  this  Scriptural  portraiture,  as  the  address 
intimates,  and  to  exalt  the  other  side  as  the  favorite  and 
the  needful  view  of  God  for  such  an  age  as  this,  with  its 
loose  sentimentalisms  in  religion  and  its  painful  lack  of 
sturdy  emphasis  upon  those  granite  principles  of  justice  on 
which  the  throne  of  God  is  eternally  reared,  then  I  greatly 
fear  that  Biblical  Theology  will  drift,  all  unconsciously, 
into  a  swift  current  of  departure  from  sound  doctrine  on 
this  point  which  such  a  Church  as  ours  will  not  be  able  to 
approve.  No  Biblical  Theology  of  this  type  is  worth  half 
as  much  as  the  plain,  comprehensive,  thoroughly  Scriptural 
definition  in  our  Shorter  Catechism.* 

BIBLICAL   THEOLOGY   CONCERNING   MAN. 

The  very  brief  statements  in  the  address  respecting  the 
biblical  doctrine  of  Man  do  not  demand  attention  beyond 
Bome  frank  recognition  of  their  meagreness,  except  at  two 
points ;  of  which  the  first  is  the  declaration  that  Protestant 
theologians  have  greatly  exaggerated  the  doctrine  of  orig- 

*  It  would  be  useless  to  begin  to  quote  references  from  Calvinistic 
theologians  like  Hodge  and  Smith  and  Shedd,  and  a  hundred  others, 
with  regard  to  the  danger  of  such  a  partial  theology  as  seems  to  be 
inculcated  in  the  address.  See  especially  H.  B.  Smith,  Syst.  of  Christ. 
TJieol.,  Part  I.,  chap,  viii.,  on  the  Divine  Love,  and  chap,  x.,  on  the 
Divine  Justice. 

Dorner  {Syst.  of  Christ.  Doct.,  vol.  iv.,  77)  says:  "The  one-sided 
emphasizing  of  a  divine  love  apart  from  justice  is  essentially  Antino- 
mian  in  nature  ;  and  in  all  its  possible  forms,  however  lofty  they  may 
seem,  sinks  back  into  an  unethical  and,  in  so  far,  essentially  physical 
ground." 


REV.   CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  41 

inal  righteousness — the  righteousness  which  our  first  par- 
ents had  before  the  fall — in  order  to  emphasize  by  contrast 
their  dogma  of  original  sin.  This  declaration  is  unsustained 
by  any  proof,  and  is  probably  incapable  of  proof  on  any 
large  scale.  Standing  where  it  does,  in  conjunction  with 
other  statements  respecting  the  first  temptation  as  a  neces- 
sary means  of  grace,  and  sin  as  a  temporary  or  transitional 
condition,  it  bears  itself  some  marks  of  an  exaggeration. 

The  second  and  more  important  point  is  the  afiirmation 
that  Biblical  Theology  reveals  to  us  in  the  Scriptures  the 
fact  of  a  race  origin,  of  a  race  sin,  of  a  race  ideal,  and  also 
of  a  race  redeemer  and  a  race  redemption.  What  the 
phrase,  a  race  redeemer,  signifies  it  is  not  easy  to  determine 
in  such  a  connection.  If  it  simply  implies  that  Christ,  in 
His  person,  character,  sacrifice,  mediatorial  mission,  was 
inherently  competent  to  save  all  mankind,  and  that  His 
Gospel  is  in  a  true  sense  provided  for  all  and  available  for 
all,  and  therefore  to  be  freely  offered  to  all  on  condition  of 
repentance  and  faith,  there  is  in  it  nothing  more  or  less 
than  is  found  habitually  in  the  current  theologies  and  in 
the  ordinary  sermons  of  our  day.  Does  the  author  intend 
to  say  more  ?  Is  the  universality  that  attaches  to  sin  in  its 
origin  and  its  development,  to  be  affirmed  in  an  uncondi- 
tioned or  unlimited  form  in  respect  to  the  Redeemer  also  ? 
He  is  able  inherently  to  save  all  men,  even  the  race,  but 
does  He  save  the  race  in  fact  ? 

So  of  the  corresponding  phrase — a  race  redemption.  If 
this  simply  means  that  the  salvation  provided  in  Christ  for 
mankind  will  ultimately  reach  so  far  and  widely,  will  be 
made  effectual  in  so  large  a  proportion  of  mankind,  that  it 
might  well  be  called  universal,  a  redemption  of  humanity, 
the  proposition  is  one  in  which  Protestants  generally  in  this 
age  are  agreed.  1  find  a  significant  parallel  to  it  in  the 
theological  writings  of  a  certain  teacher  whom  Dr.  Briggs 


42  THE  INAUGURAL  ADDRESS  OF 

regards  as  wholly  wedded  to  a  strict  traditionalism :  "  We 
have  reason  to  believe  that  the  number  of  the  finally  lost, 
in  comparison  with  the  whole  number  of  the  saved,  will  be 
very  inconsiderable.  Our  blessed  Lord,  when  surrounded 
by  the  innumerable  company  of  the  redeemed,  will  be 
hailed  as  the  Salvator  Hominum,  the  Saviour  of  men."  * 
But  does  Bibhcal  Theology  teach  us  anything  more  than 
this  ?  Is  there  to  be  a  race  redemption  in  any  sense  more 
comprehensive,  more  universal  ?  The  author  explains  him- 
self in  another  place  by  the  statement  that,  though  the 
Bible  teaches  the  salvation  of  the  world,  of  the  race  of 
man,  it  does  not  teach  universal  salvation.  Still  further 
explanation  may  be  found  in  his  statement,  which  is  obvi- 
ous enough,  that  some  theologians,  under  the  influence  of 
a  narrow  view  of  election  as  to  its  definiteness  and  its  range, 
have  formed  too  low  an  estimate  of  the  freeness  and  ex- 
tent, the  cosmic  quality  and  efficacy,  of  the  scheme  of 
grace. 

BIBLICAL   THEOLOGY   CONCERNING   REDEMPTION. 

Perhaps  the  account  of  Redemption  under  the  third 
general  head  of  Biblical  doctrine,  explains  still  further  the 
position  of  the  author.  He  habitually  contemplates  that 
redemption  on  its  subjective  rather  than  its  objective  side  : 
he  accepts  the  Christus  in  nobis  of  the  Lutheran  theology 
more  cordially  than  the  Christus  pro  nobis  of  Calvinism. 
Bedemption,  in  his  view,  is  the  transformation  of  the  sin- 
ful and  suffering  race  of  man  into  the  image  of  God,  as  He 
is  made  manifest  in  Christ ;   and  this  transformation  in- 

*  Hodge,  Syst.  TlieoL,  vol.  iii.,  879,  880;  see  also  vol.  i.  Shedd, 
Syst.  Tlieol.,  vol.  i.,  422  :  "The  number  of  the  lost  angels  and  men  is 
small,  compared  with  the  whole  number  of  rational  creatures.  Sin  is 
a  speck  upon  the  iufiuite  azure  of  eternity.  Hell  is  a  corner  of  the 
imiverse  ;  it  is  a  hole  or  pit,  not  an  ocean  :  bottomless  but  not  bound- 
less."   Also  vol.  ii.,  745, 


KEV.   CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  43 

eludes  the  whole  nature  and  the  whole  life  of  man,  and 
indeed  of  the  race.  His  references  to  this  transfor- 
mation, especially  as  connected  with  his  view  of  the 
Messiahship,  are  worthy  of  the  closest  attention.  But  here 
again  he  arraigns  the  theologians,  on  the  ground  that  they 
do  not  contemplate  redemption  in  its  fullness :  more  spe- 
cifically that  they  emphasize  unduly  the  beginnings  of  re- 
demption in  our  justification  by  faith,  and  also  our  regen- 
eration, as  distinct  from  the  work  of  sanctification.  He 
alleges  that  modern  theology  does  not  comprehend  the 
process  of  grace  in  its  fullness — does  not  treat  as  it  ought  of 
renovation  and  transformation  and  sanctification,  of  faith 
and  repentance  and  holy  love.  Respecting  this  general 
arraignment,  which  is  a  blemish  upon  a  discussion  that 
otherwise  attracts  sympathy,  it  is  enough  to  say  here  that  it 
would  be  hard  to  find  a  theological  treatise  of  our  time 
which  would  justify  such  a  charge. 

But  the  chief  issue  of  the  author  with  modern  theology 
in  this  connection  is  found  in  what  he  describes  as  a  limita- 
tion of  the  process  of  redemption  to  this  world,  and  it  is 
here  that  modern  theology  of  the  Protestant  type  finds  one 
of  its  most  serious  issues  with  him.  He  tells  us  that  the 
Protestant  theologians,  even  more  than  the  Roman  Catho- 
lic, have  neglected  those  vast  periods  of  time  which  lie  be- 
tween death  and  the  resurrection.  He  tells  us  that  the 
bugbear  of  a  judgment  immediately  after  death, — in  other 
words,  a  final  division  and  separation  of  men  as  individuals 
occurring  at  death,  on  the  basis  of  character,  under  a  spe- 
cific adjudication  by  God  in  Christ, — is  a  conceit  imported 
from  the  ethnic  or  natural  religions,  and  without  any  basis 
whatever  in  the  Bible  or  in  Christian  experience  or  the 
Christian  symbols ;  and  he  further  denounces  the  doctrine 
as  something  calculated  to  make  death  a  terror  to  the  best 
of  men.     In  the  same  strain  he  protests  against  what  he 


44  THE  INAUGUKAL  ADDRESS  OF 

styles  the  illusion  of  a  magical  transformation  of  the  sonl 
at  death  into  a  condition  of  immediate  and  perfect  holiness. 
This  illusion  comes — he  tells  us — from  the  same  pagan 
sources,  is  equally  unsustained  by  Scripture,  cuts  the  nerve 
of  Christian  activity  and  effort  after  holiness,  and  makes 
our  human  life  and  experience  of  no  value.  Both  of  these 
common  doctrines,  he  affirms  in  impassioned  words,  are 
hurtful  and  unchristian  errors,  which  ought  to  be  banished 
from  the  world.  And  as  a  substitute  for  them  he  proposes 
the  dogma  of  a  progressive  sanctification,  to  be  carried  on 
through  the  intermediate  state,  and  as  far  as  the  day  of 
final  judgment — a  dogma  for  which  he  claims  the  indorse- 
ment, not  only  of  the  Bible,  but  also  of  Christian  orthodoxy 
and  Christian  experience. 

If  the  phrase,  progressive  sanctification,  simply  meaTis 
that  the  sainted  dead  continue  even  through  all  eternity 
to  grow  in  all  the  graces  and  virtues  which  constitute  the 
Christian  character  on  earth,  there  is  nothing  in  it  beyond 
what  most  believers  hold — nothing  that  is  in  any  degree  new 
or  specially  helpful  as  a  fresh  contribution  to  faith.  The 
living  unto  righteousness  which  our  Catechism  gives  as  the 
second  element  of  sanctification,  is  by  its  own  nature  a  state 
of  the  soul  which  may  be  said  never  to  reach  an  end  or  a 
culmination,  even  throughout  eternity.  What  is  to  be  said 
of  the  first  element  in  that  familiar  definition,  the  dying 
more  and  more  unto  sin  ?  Does  the  author  hold  that  the 
saint  carries  with  him  into  the  eternal  state  some  remaining 
taints  and  seeds  of  sin,  which  are  to  be  progressively  elim- 
inated by  the  discipline  of  that  state,  so  that  he  becomes 
entirely  free  from  sin  and  its  pollutions  only  after  untold 
ages  of  existence  in  that  intermediate  world  ?  The  favora- 
ble terms  in  which  he  refers  to  the  Koman  Catholic  doc- 
trine of  purgatorial  purification  in  the  case  of  imperfect 
saints,  would  seem  to  imply  that  what  has  just  been  stated 


KEV.    CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  45 

is  in  substance  his  personal  belief.  How  marked  the  con- 
trast is  between  any  such  concept  of  a  dying  unto  sin  on  the 
part  of  believers  in  eternity  and  the  current  conviction  of 
Protestantism,  may  be  seen  in  the  simple,  beautiful,  pathetic 
sentence  in  our  Shorter  Catechism  :  The  souls  of  believers 
are  at  their  death  made  perfect  in  holiness,  and  do  imine- 
diately  pass  into  glory.  The  broadened  form  of  this  state- 
ment in  the  Larger  Catechism  is  still  more  simple,  beautiful, 
pathetic  :  The  communion  in  glory  with  Christ  which  the 
members  of  the  invisible  Church  enjoy  immediately  after 
death,  is  in  that  their  souls  are  then  made  perfect  in  holi- 
ness, and  received  into  the  highest  heavens,  where  they 
behold  the  face  of  God  in  light  and  glory.  How  Dr. 
Briggs,  in  the  presence  of  such  declarations  as  these,  can 
affirm  that  the  doctrine  of  immediate  sanctification  at  death 
has  no  warrant  in  the  creeds  of  Christendom  or  in  Church 
belief,  but  is  a  mischievous  conceit  imported  from  the 
ethnic  religions  into  Christianity,  it  is  difficult  to  explain. 
And  it  may  be  added  here  that  the  doctrine  of  our  own 
Confession  includes  infants  as  well  as  believing  adults  in 
this  process  of  immediate  sanctification,  they  also  being 
redeemed  by  Christ  and  regenerated  at  once  and  com- 
pletely, so  far  as  all  seeds  or  taints  of  sin  are  concerned,  by 
the  Holy  Ghost  who  worketh  when  and  where  and  how 
He  pleaseth,  in  death  as  in  life. 

What  does  the  address  teach  in  regard  to  the  intermediate 
state  of  others  than  believers  and  infants  ?  It  admits  that 
there  will  be  some  among  men  who  by  their  rejection  of 
the  Gospel  and  by  hardening  themselves  against  it,  will 
descend  into  such  depths  of  demoniacal  depravity — to  use 
its  own  impressive  description — that  they  will  ultimately 
vanish  from  the  sight  of  the  redeemed  forever  as  altogether 
and  irredeemably  evil  ;  whether  to  an  eternity  of  punish- 
ment after  the  final  judgment,  or  to  an  eternal  annihilation 


46  THE  INAUGURAL  ADDEESS  OF 

at  some  point  in  the  future,  the  address  does  not  inform  us. 
But  we  are  told  in  one  place  that  this  descent  is  made  in 
the  intermediate  state  rather  than  in  the  present  life  ;  and 
in  another  connection  that  there  is  no  doctrine  of  second 
probation,  or  probation  after  death,  in  the  Word  of  God  ; 
and  in  still  another  that  there  is  no  judicial  separation  or 
division  of  men  at  death  into  classes  on  the  basis  of  their 
individual  character  and  life  on  earth.  It  is  diflScult  to 
formulate  an  intelligible  theological  statement  from  these 
three  propositions  when  brought  together.  If  there  is  no 
particular  judgment  in  the  sense  just  stated,  and  no  oppor- 
tunity for  those  who  have  rejected  Christ  in  this  world  to 
accept  Him  and  be  saved  through  Him  in  the  intermediate 
state,  what  does  that  state  become  ?  Do  the  holy  and  the 
unholy  dwell  together  there  in  a  condition  of  consciousness 
and  with  intermingled  experiences  ?  Are  they  separated, 
according  to  character,  by  some  occult  law  of  affinity — the 
one  class  dwelling  in  Paradise,  the  other  in  some  retribu- 
tive Gehenna?  Are  any  of  those  who  dwell  apart  in  such 
Gehenna  ever  permitted  to  cross  the  deep  gulf,  and  join 
the  saints  in  Paradise  ?  Can  this  intermediate  state  be  re- 
garded as  in  any  sense  a  state  where  new  experiences  may 
perchance  bring  new  characters  to  those  who  die  in  unbe- 
lief ?  Are  the  real  characters  of  men  indeterminate,  and 
their  punishment  as  sinners  postponed,  during  this  long 
period  prior  to  the  resurrection  ?  Does  God  leave  myriads 
of  sinners,  age  after  age,  imprisoned  but  uncondemned,  yet 
without  possible  change  in  their  condition  ?  Is  the  func- 
tion assigned  to  Christ  as  the  Judge  of  men  to  be  exercised 
only  at  the  final  day,  so  that  He  reaches  no  decision  respect- 
ing the  uncounted  millions  whom  His  eye  sees  in  this  in- 
termediate estate,  neither  of  probation  nor  of  retribution  ? 
Such  questions  crowd  upon  us  from  many  sides,  but  the 
address  helps  us  to  no  real  answer  ;  the  speaker  is  silent. 


KEY.    CHARLES   A.   BRIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  47 

Dr.  Briggs  justly  says,  as  he  approaches  his  conclusion, 
that  the  inductive  study  of  the  Bible,  such  as  his  new  chair 
contemplates,  forces  us  to  study  every  word,  sentence,  and 
clause,  and  to  ascend  in  the  induction  from  stage  to  stage, 
until  the  whole  organism  of  the  Bible,  the  sum  total  of  its 
teaching  on  any  subject,  rises  beautiful  and  precious  before 
our  sight.  If  he  will  but  pursue  this  method,  which,  in- 
deed, all  considerate  theologians  strive  to  follow  in  their 
researches,  he  will  find  that  the  doctrine  of  an  immediate 
sanctification  of  all  believers  and  infants  at  death,  with  its 
correlate  in  the  sanctification  of  no  others  during  the  inter- 
mediate life,  and  the  kindred  doctrine  of  a  particular  judg- 
ment of  all  men  at  death  on  the  basis  of  character,  are  not 
vain  conceits  dragged  into  Christianity  from  the  ethnic 
faiths  by  stupid  teachers  of  the  Church,  but  rather  are 
verities  as  demonstrable  and  as  incontestable  as  is  the  doc- 
trine of  eternity  itself.  And  if  he  desires  further  confirm- 
ation of  this  fact,  he  may  find  it  in  the  following  words 
from  that  revered  and  now  sainted  teacher  at  whose  feet  it 
was  once  his  privilege  to  sit :  "  This  judgment "  (the  final 
judgment  of  which  Dr.  Smith  is  speaking)  "  is  not  the  first 
passing  of  judgment,  but  the  final  manifestation  of  it.  It 
is  the  end  of  a  mediatorial  kingdom — the  consummation  of 
an  economy.  The  position  that  at  this  judgment  the  first 
passing  of  judgment  will  occur,  uproots  the  Scriptural  doc- 
trine of  sin  and  of  the  penalty  of  death,  which  has  already 
begun  to  be  inflicted  upon  men."  * 

*  H.  B.  Smith,  8i/st.  of  Christ.  Theol.,  p.  613.  For  his  doctrine  of 
sanctification,  see  pp.  575-579.  For  his  clear  proposition  that  there  is 
no  sufficient  scriptural  warrant  for  the  notion  of  an  intermediate  state 
in  ■which  destiny  is  not  yet  decided,  see  pp.  604-606.  For  the  same 
view,  see  also  Shedd,  Dogm.  Theol.,  11.,  616-624. 

Dr.  Briggs  speaks  -with  great  emphasis  of  the  privilege  he  has  en- 
joyed in  sitting  as  a  learner  at  the  feet  of  two  men  whom  he  reveres 
above  all  others— Henry  Boynton  Smith  and  Isaac  Augustus  Dorncr. 


48  THE  INAUGURAL   ADDRESS   OF 


CONCLUDING    SUGGESTIONS. 

It  is  not  to  be  expected  that  within  the  confines  of  one 
brief  address  Professor  Briggs  should  furnish  a  complete 
outline  of  the  topics  with  which  he  will  be  occupied  in  his 
new  and  most  inviting  department  of  instruction.  But  it 
may  as  well  be  confessed  that  the  summary  of  opinions 
which  he  has  given  in  this  address  under  the  three  general 
heads  named,  together  with  what  is  said  afterwards  under 
the  title  of  Biblical  Ethics  and  of  the  Messiahship,  is  not 
such  as  to  excite  lively  apprehensions,  lest,  under  the  de- 
One  cannot  well  refrain  from  remembering  that  both  of  these  men 
belonged  to  that  class  of  persons  to  whom  the  address  refers  so  often 
in  such  terms  of  contempt.  The  first  of  these  men  was  in  a  marked 
degree  philosophical,  and  at  times  speculative,  but  also  always  system- 
atic and  historical  and  strongly  confessional,  as  he  was  highly  spir- 
itual, in  his  theology.  The  second  was  one  of  the  most  abstract, 
speculative,  unconf  essional,  individualistic  in  his  thinking,  even  among 
German  theologians — the  Schleiermacher  of  our  time. 

It  is  interesting  to  inquire  from  which  of  these  two  great  theologians 
the  Biblical  Theology  described  in  this  address  has  been  derived.  So 
far  as  the  writer,  who  has  read  the  published  productions  of  the  first 
with  care  for  a  long  time,  has  been  able  to  discover,  the  fact  is  that 
there  is  hardly  one  of  the  new  views  here  expressed  for  which  the 
support  of  Dr.  Smith  can  justly  be  quoted  :  his  writings  show  that  on 
several  important  points  he  taught  exactly  the  opposite.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  careful  reader  of  the  System  of  Christian  Doctrine,  by  Dor- 
ner,  will  find  most  of  them  there.  The  German  theologian  not  only 
denies  the  doctrine  of  a  judicial  decision  at  death,  but  openly  affirms 
a  second  probation,  with  a  probability  of  the  ultimate  restoration  of 
all  men.  He  also  holds  to  a  progressive  sanctitication  of  believers 
after  death  in  the  broadest  form.  His  conception  of  man  and  of  grace 
is  decidedly  univcrsalistic.  In  common  with  nearly  all  German  the- 
ologians, he  makes  comparatively  little  of  that  grand  doctrine  of  the 
Moral  Government  of  God,  which  men  like  Butler  and  Edwards 
taught  and  wliieh  has  been  the  ground  and  support  of  much  of  the 
best  American  theology  of  our  time.  Domer  is  to  be  read  carefully 
for  his  many  remarkable  and  suggestive  teachings,  but  is  also  to  be 
read  and  followed  with  great  caution. 


KEV.   CHARLES   A.   BEIGGS,   D.D.,   LL.D.  49 

molisbing  influence  of  this  new  mode  of  setting  forth  the 
truths  of  Scripture,  the  good  old  systematic  but  really  no 
less  biblical  way  will  be  banished  at  an  early  day  from  the 
earth.  Nor  does  it  justify  the  confident  prediction  that 
the  incoming  of  this  new  dogmatic  cultus  will  not  only 
work  a  transformation  of  theology,  but  bring  in  at  once 
the  spring-time  of  a  new  age  of  glory,  be  the  precursor  of 
a  reformation  grander  than  that  of  Luther  and  Calvin,  and 
finally  bring  to  pass  the  unity  of  Christendom.  And  wlien 
at  the  end  we  are  told  that  the  theology  of  the  creeds  as  it 
stands,  is  only  the  water-mark  of  a  present  consensus  of 
attainment,  to  be  swept  away  in  the  developments  of  the 
future ;  and  that  even  the  best  of  these  creeds  gives  us  only 
a  small  theology,  when  compared  with  the  length  and 
breadth,  the  height  and  depth,  of  the  Theology  of  the 
Bible,  as  this  is  now  and  henceforth  to  be  taught  to  men, 
we  can  only  reply,  in  much  humility,  that  we  are  willing 
to  wait  and  see. 

The  writer  cannot  conclude  this  frank  review  of  an  ad- 
dress in  many  respects  remarkable,  without  some  expression 
both  of  interest  and  of  regret.  The  high  degree  of  in- 
tellectual vigor,  of  mental  and  moral  earnestness,  of  intense 
personal  conviction,  of  fearless  loyalty  to  what  the  author 
regards  as  truth,  cannot  be  too  cordially  commended.  The 
extensive  reading  manifest  on  the  topics  discussed,  and  the 
diligent  though  not  always  consistent  or  judicious  use  of 
the  material  acquired,  ought  to  be  appreciated  by  every 
reader.  Wliile  it  is  difiicult  sometimes  to  make  his  state- 
ments agree  with  one  another  or  to  harmonize  them  with 
creeds  and  systems  to  which  he  avows  full  allegiance,  it  is 
hard  to  imagine  that  the  speaker  does  not  see  the  agreement, 
or  to  suppose  that  his  professions  of  loyalty  are  not  genuine 
to  the  core.  Much  that  is  said  awakens  spontaneous  sym- 
pathy  and  can  but  deepen  the  love  for  him  cherished  by 


y 


50  THE  INAUGURAL  ADDRESS. 

many,  not  in  our  Church  alone,  but  in  other  denominations 
and  in  other  lands.  And  in  the  presence  of  so  many  ex- 
cellent qualities,  small  blemishes  of  whatever  sort  may 
easily  be  forgotten. 

But  the  writer  is  bound,  with  deep  regret,  to  say  that  in 
his  judgment  the  address  contains  too  much  that  is  defect- 
ive either  in  doctrine  or  in  statement,  too  much  that  will 
not  justify  itself  at  the  bar  of  sober  judgment,  too  much 
that  seems  to  carry  in  itself  germinant  seeds  of  error,  too 
much  that  is  more  or  less  at  variance  with  the  teachings  of 
a  safe  and  free  and  scriptural  theology,  too  much  that  ap- 
pears to  run  counter,  at  least  in  form,  to  our  symbols  and 
to  some  of  the  holiest  convictions  of  the  Church.  And  in 
recording  this  judgment,  formed  in  no  temper  of  hostility 
and  expressed  only  under  a  deep  sense  of  duty,  the  writer 
hopes  that  his  words  may  in  some  degree  contribute  to 
check  troublous  departures  from  the  straight  and  clear  path 
of  progress  theological  and  spiritual,  to  bring  the  truth  on 
the  grave  themes  discussed  into  fuller  and  happier  light, 
and  through  the  truth  to  confirm  the  belief  and  promote 
the.  loving  unity  of  the  Church. 


